Childhood is a time when we always need toys as warm and gentle friends. They awaken imagination, inspire creativity, and, like narrators, tell tales without spoken words. This is a period when we are learning about the environment and developing awareness about everything that surrounds us, we use our sense of touch, trying to tell apart colours, materials, shapes, to satisfy our curiosity. Will a child be active, responsible, social or passive, asocial, depends on the toys which contribute to developing creativity, an inquisitive spirit, cooperation with other children and many other things.

The abilities that can prove as vital later on develop in earlier ages while children go through early stages of development by playing as they learn to be patient, increase their level of concentration, attention and the feeling of keeping up with their co-player during playtime.

The toys should be of good quality, made of natural materials and colours in order to enrich the child’s world. The toys can be equally interesting and appealing to children whether they are made of textile or wood.

Toys made of natural material:

1. support development of motor skills, intelligence and observation skills;
2. incite development of social and linguistic skills;
3. stimulate motor skills development and movement coordination, logic judgement, memory and deductive skills;
4.  boost ecological awareness since early age, and
5. are longer lasting and safer, excluding the continuous use of batteries or need for repair services.

Find toys that give meaning to the word playing. Copyright: Oksana Kuzmina

Naturally, you will need to adjust the toys to the age of a child. I would like to point out to a large active cube that can be used for children to recognize numbers, agility and logic deduction in our discussion about wooden toys. The toy consists of 7 different coloured wooden shapes that you place in modified “holes” on a cube. The children devote much more attention to them. They can’t separate themselves from playing with them so easily, while they also develop their motor skills and spend quality time. Also this is an excellent game that can motivate you as well to engage in an active play with children.

The truly creative ones among you can use recycled materials and build doll houses or perhaps a ragged ball for boys and music instruments.It is the right moment to awaken your inner child, while YouTube can aid you in finding the easiest way to make such unique toys.

The plush toys can serve as a unique aid in education apart from having symbolic importance. You can use the  plush toy as a model for studying social skills and obligations. You can illustrate better the importance of hygiene to children by showing a dirty plush toy. The children often take plush toys with them. You should allow them to do so, because it represents a development of independence among children. They represent someone that is close to children and a subject of special affection.

Therefore, forget about trendy shops packed with plastic and electronic devices. Find toys that give meaning to the word playing. Try to make their growing up more beautiful through useful games. The children will be endlessly grateful and you will be proud of them when you see them grow into resourceful, creative and good people.

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Before enrolling in kindergarten, or even day nursery, kids hang out only with their toys. I call that children’s “first” socialization. In this “in-between” period, children can learn and practice how to establish communication. They are also building basic life skills such as empathy, care, dedication, responsibility, selflessness, independence, loyalty, and gratitude.

Let me tell you a story so to illustrate why it’s important to teach children to take care of toys. There once was a boy named Sam, who had a best friend, Happy the bunny. Happy the bunny and Sam wake up every morning at the same time. They brush their teeth together and wash their faces. Then they have breakfast together and play with other toys.

During this playtime, it was necessary for Sam to understand and know that he needs to take care of all the toys, he cannot be rough to other toys and that there’s a specific way to use each toy.

After playtime, all the toys had to be put back in their “toy house” (except for Happy, of course). At the very beginning, Sam did so begrudgingly. Mom and dad talked to Sam in the presence of Happy, including him in their arrangements as an equal member of the family. When Happy would “speak”, everything would go smoother and agreements would be nicer, faster and better. The toys must be picked up so they wouldn’t get lost or broken if someone steps on them, and if that happens, mom and dad will not buy new toys.

They have dinner together, sometimes they eat what Sam likes, and sometimes they what Sam likes a little less, but it is healthy and Happy loves it. Together they listen to bedtime stories and they go to sleep. Now, dad can freely turn off the lamp on his way out, because the boy doesn’t feel like he is alone in the room.

A little before 4 o’clock, Happy and Sam are crouching in front of the door, waiting for dad to come home from work. They must always get equally as hard a hug from dad when he finally arrives.

On the first summer vacation, they fell together when the first wave toppled them while playing in the shallow water. However, Sam didn’t cry because he swallowed a lot of water and fell, but because Happy lost an eye and “sneezed” salt for three days afterward. Still, he didn’t want to replace one-eyed Happy and instead, they performed a “surgery’ and cured him. Soon afterward, in one heroic clash between Sam and the dentist, the bunny permanently lost his eye in the sink.

However, the boy did not want another “surgery”, he just continued to carry the bunny around and love it the way it was.

The first day at the kindergarten was stressful for both of them. Sam cried, and when mom and dad left, Happy stayed to hold his hand. According to Sam, the bunny introduced him to other children and help them become friends. But, it was also hard for Sam to see other children taking Happy and playing. Sam was a little upset and little “something” he did not know how to explain. When they came home, mom, dad, Sam, and Happy had a family talk and found that it was absolutely fine for Happy to sometimes play with others. They fought through the adaptation period together, and according to the kindergarten teacher, they did it much faster than some other children.

Sam’s parents heard many times how it wasn’t good that he “dragged” that bunny everywhere he went, and that they had to explain to him it was only a toy and somehow separate him from the bunny – “It’s embarrassing to see, a big boy, about to start pre-school, dragging some bunny around.”

Fortunately, parents decided to listen to their son, and not the rest of the world. When the moment arrived, Happy sat on the shelf on its own and with it’s one eye watched his best friend do homework and become a man, just as they practiced together.

Let’s go back to the beginning now. Sam learned valuable things with one plush toy, so let’s “settle that score”.

1. Attention given to toys later reflects as attention toward younger members in the family, a pet, and personal belongings in general.

Playing with toys is an excellent example for a child to learn to follow the rules in life. To play fair and not act aggressively when something doesn’t go its way. You’ll notice that the older and shabbier the toys are, the children love them stronger and do not want to replace them for a new and nice one. Children often carry around teddy bears or bunnies missing an eye or an arm, but they still remain inseparable. That’s love and loyalty, personally. That’s the model they will learn then and then apply it to all other relationships. It also teaches children how to take small items and little attention as truly precious things.

2. The price is the time you didn’t get to spend with your child and that is why there are no cheap toys.

A child must know that the things they have – they have it owing to the moments you didn’t get to spend time with them because you are working, and they need you. Treating toys with care is direct respect for the money parents paid for them.

3. Toys can sometimes be a reward for proper behavior or encouragement for a desired one.

Let them do something they are able to (water flowers or clean the dust), and then give them the toy. My experience has shown me that they are going to love it more than other toys. This is also a great way for them to realize that things must be deserved – earned. Working habits are formed from the moment children become aware of the world around them. Not a minute sooner, not a minute later. These are coded patiently, in small steps adjusted to their age. The first step they should make is to put their first friends in their improvised homes. Once this becomes their habit, they will expand their responsibilities on their own, as they get older.

4. Children learn according to a model, they watch and imitate, and toys can be very useful in this case.

Children do not possess an awareness of the importance of personal hygiene or a healthy diet. There are things they don’t like to do. So it would be nice and useful to involve their favorite toy in those activities and to help them. It is much easier when they see someone next to them doesn’t cry while washing their hair or eating vegetables.

5. A toy is a great thing for defeating any fear a child might have.

Fear is abstract, it is difficult to explain and even more difficult to overcome. With toys by their side, children can “tangibly” see that nothing happened when they went through something a child is afraid of. If a child talks to their toy, it is nothing problematic, but good. They formed an emotional bond and it is natural for them to have an imaginary dialogue. That way, children further develop their imagination and emotional intelligence. They realize that someone gets them, listens to them, understands them, feels sad or happy with them, or hugs them. It is a very important prerequisite for becoming emphatic.

6. Children deal with the first separation more easily if they have their best plush friends with them.

Every beginning is hard for children. Besides new people, children in that period get to know themselves and the undiscovered sides to their personalities. For the first time, they feel jealous or jeopardized. However, they don’t even know what that is or how to tell you and explain it to you. All of it will be less prominent and stressful if they know that someone “from home” is holding their hand.

All toys are a bit of Happy the bunny, or at least they should be. Parents, if you picked up toys as children, bravo and well done. If you continue to do so as an adult, think about how much the change of the practice will impact your child’s development. Oh, and also, does your child have their “Happy the bunny”?

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On a trip down the typical toy aisle at any major department store, one inevitably encounters a blaring, pink section filled with Barbie Dolls, plastic jewelry, fluffy animals, and any number of stereotypically “girly” items we are told young women should enjoy. We buy them easy-bake ovens, plastic plates and teacups, and the cutest, pinkest aprons we can find, and with these items, our young girls learn to play the roles of housewife or mother they are taught they are destined to take in the future. With so many young women bombarded by an abundance of well-intentioned but ultimately stereotypically “feminine” gifts from their parents, is it any wonder that so few of them even entertain the possibility of entering into such traditionally male-dominated fields as engineering when they grow up? Society never gives them any impression that they should strive for such jobs.

Debbie Sterling, a former engineering student from Stanford University who was shocked and distressed by the near total lack of female students in her program, wants to change this sad trend and help usher in a new generation of female engineers. GoldieBlox is a toy company which offers girls a viable alternative to the standard, fluffy princess dolls and dresses which we normally provide as playthings for our young girls. Instead of dolls and trinkets, GoldieBlox offers construction toys and books in the hopes of inspiring dreams of engineering in the hearts of the younger generation.

At the beginning of the commercial for GoldieBlox toys, we are introduced to three young girls in front of a television, slumping over in disinterest at a doll commercial. To solve their boredom, they, clothed in small engineering outfits, create an elaborate system of gadgets and trinkets which twists and turns through the house and around the yard until it finally presses the channel button and switches the screen from the doll commercial and to a screen of a blonde girl with an engineering hat and overalls. This is Goldie Blox, an engineer, and – shockingly! – a girl as well.

The Goldie Blox we are shown in this commercial represents one version of an ideal girl which we rarely see amongst the lines of princess dolls and fairy cartoons which normally graces the pink toys aisle at the department store. She is pretty, but this is not her defining feature. She is smart, she is resourceful, and she has little or no interest in dresses or sparkly things. This is a new vision of the young woman, one which allows girls to feel as though an interest in building and creating things is just as desirable and just as fun than an interest in clothes and pink, frilly things. She represents an attempt to represent what the ideal girl might look like if the gender roles which define most of girls’ toys had simply disappeared.

What would happen if we were simply rid of the flashy, pink toy aisle at the department store? Would the world collapse? Or would girls finally feel free to explore those traditionally masculine pursuits, such as building and engineering? GoldieBlox seeks to establish this world of equality between the genders, beginning with the utter destruction of the gender stereotypes which prevent so many of our bright young women from exploring the world of engineering.

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We recently told you the best toys to give your little one (that are safe and will stimulate your child’s development). Now it is time to make yourself aware of the worst toys for your children.

The worst gift you can give

A toy can be bad in a number of ways. It could be inappropriate for the age of the child (for example, small parts on a toy would not be safe for an infant, who could choke) or it could be inappropriate no matter the age of the child (for example, a toy gun). Here are some of the worst types of toys you could give your child:

• Toys that do it all… already: Imagination is key for a child’s creative development. Dolls or stuffed animals that talk or sing when a child presses a button take the imagination out of the play situation and are especially unsuitable for children over the age of 18 months. “When a toy is too specific, it’s limiting and it denies the child the ability to use her imagination,” says Vicki Panaccione, PhD, a child psychologist and founder of the Better Parenting Institute.¹
• Video games: We live in an electronic age and are lucky enough that some manufacturers have been able to come up with video games that are suitable for a child’s development. But this is not the case for most. Research has suggested that electronic toys pose several possible dangers for a child’s health and development, including hearing loss (from loud games), weight gain (from being inactive), and language and developmental delays.² A study from Temple University showed that toys that do not require a child to take any action except watch promote a passive learning style, which can interfere with learning to think independently. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, kids under age 2 should not watch TV or play computer games at all and kids over age 2 should have their “screen time” limited to 1-2 hours per day. So if you want your gift to go a long way, a video game is not the gift for your child.

• Toy Guns: The most inappropriate gift for a child is a toy gun. With the school shootings and gun violence in our society, the worst idea is for a child to receive a gun as a gift and think it is acceptable. It is important children can recognize the violence with guns in television shows and movies is fake and not imagine themselves doing the same actions with a toy gun.

How to recognize a toy is unsuitable for children

When you are shopping for a toy for your child, unsafe or unsuitable toys often have the following characteristics:³

• Do not meet basic safety checks (toys should not chip or emit colors) and do not indicate “suitable for children.”
• Promote violence, the practice of unhealthy habits, and discrimination of because of race, culture, gender, etc.
• Are impractical and useless.
• Are inadequate for the intended child and do not respond to their interests, age or tastes.

Be aware of dangerous toys

In 2010, an estimated 181,500 children were treated in an emergency room for a toy-related injury. Almost half of those injured were children age 4 and under.⁴

Some toys can be a choking hazard or can cause serious eye injuries and vision loss. Dr. Maurice Zadeh, president of the Georgia Optometric Association, says parents should be aware of these warnings:⁵

• Avoid toys with sharp or rigid points.
• Keep toys meant for older children away from younger children.
• Avoid flying toys and projectile-firing toys

Your children will likely be gifted numerous toys this time of year. If they are lucky enough to receive ones that are good for their development, it is still important to only keep a few out at one time. Children given too many toys at one time have a hard time focusing on any one of them completely. Rotate the toys in and out of a toy box or your child’s room and let them fully explore one toy before introducing another.

Staying away from unsafe and inappropriate toys will help your child have a merrier Christmas (and a better future!).

References:

• 1 http://www.webmd.com/parenting/features/choosing-right-toys-for-right-age
• 2 http://www.webmd.com/parenting/features/choosing-right-toys-for-right-age
• 3 http://earlychildhoodeducationwebsites.blogspot.com/2012/08/toys-and-development-of-children.html
• 4 http://www.citizen-times.com/article/20131217/LIVING/312170027/Guest-column-Buying-safe-fun-toys-gifts
• 5 http://www.wrdw.com/news/homeandfamily/headlines/4656771.html

Photo credit: Kalexanderson / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

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