5 Repetition Games Your Child Will Actually Love

The Purpose of Repetition Games

Children need to repeat new pieces and techniques many, many times to move them into the muscle memory. These games are designed to infuse that repetitive process with humor, imagination, and joy. 

#1: Cup Game

For this game, you’ll need 8 or more cups and one small prize. The prize can be anything pretty, tasty, or interesting. It must fit under the cups. 

Put all the cups upside-down on a table or the floor. Ask your child to look away, and place the prize under one of the cups. For each correct repetition your child performs, they’ve earned the right to turn over one cup. As soon as your child finds the prize, they can stop doing repetitions for that day. More cups make it more likely that you’ll get a higher number of repetitions in before the prize is found. 

#2: Earn Project Materials

What hands-on projects is your child interested in? Can the materials be broken down into small, earn-able pieces? You could let your child earn a Lego piece each time she completes a repetition, and have a minute or two to build a small Lego structure once all the repetitions are done. You could do the same with puzzle pieces, blocks, or arts-and-crafts materials. The prospect of a creative task at the end of the monotonous repetitions your child is being asked to complete is usually very enticing. 

#3: Parent Challenges

Sometimes, nothing gets a kid out of a funk like an adult doing something absolutely ridiculous. Tell your child that for each correct repetition, you’ll balance another book on your head. They will not be able to resist doing as many repetitions as it takes for those books to come crashing down! Or, tell them that for each repetition you’ll put another grape in your mouth. Didn’t think they had the stamina for twenty perfect bow holds today? Think again!

#4: Steps Across the Room

Position your child in one corner of the room and yourself in an opposite corner, and face each other. For every correct repetition of a task, your child can take one step toward you. Once you are together in the far corner, you can be done with that task! You can come up with fun variations of this one, like taking baby steps or giant steps, hopping, hopping on one foot, twirling, lunging, you name it. 

#5: Race the Clock

This is a great way to get that competitive streak going in a reluctant child. Ask the child to perform as many correct repetitions as possible within one minute. Treat it like a real race, playing up the drama with a countdown and a huge cheer at the finish line. Then, see if the child can beat their own time! One of my favorite variations of this one is a countdown for being ready to play. Children who are sometimes reluctant to heave the violin back onto their shoulder and find their fiftieth correct bow hold that day will suddenly snap to attention as soon as you start counting: “10…9…8…are your feet in the right place?...7…6…is your pinky curved?...5…4…”