Typically developing toddlers spend much of their time engaged in exploratory play with toys and other objects as a way of practising routines and learning about the world and interacting with others.

Children engage in more social behaviour at younger ages with familiar friends, more so than with less familiar children.

Small toys can also serve as a focus for children's social play as they show them to each other or offer and accept them. Large toys that require some cooperation such as a rocking boat or climber give children chances to imitate each other's large motor behaviour and practise turn-taking.

However, when there are few toys, children spend more time looking, smiling, gesturing, and vocalising to each other.

Varying the number and type of toys available during particular play periods can encourage object play, imitation and interaction with other children.

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4. Hagens, H. E. (1997). Strategies for encouraging peer interactions in infant/toddler programmes. Early Childhood Education Journal, 25, 147–149. (Level III) USA.

Barriers help prevent children from accidentally knocking into or hurting another child. When very young children are in larger groups, they tend to focus on the toys instead of each other. There are likely to be more bumps and pushes amongst a group of toddlers focussed on their activities than with a pair paying attention to one another.

This kind of separation can be beneficial in groups of children with differing locomotor abilities so that the ones crawling do not get knocked down by those who are running around.