Building blocks naturally attract children, which is great because playing with blocks helps children develop many life skills essential for a happy life. These strengths include language, physical, cognitive, and emotional development. Activity ideas focused on these areas, when planned, increase children’s learning and overall growth potential.
In addition, studies show that complex block building activities help children learn necessary math skills as they discover mathematical combinations and associate the numerical value of block quantities. This article provides a variety of activity ideas for playing with building blocks.
Very young children around 1-1 / 2 years of age and older can begin to play with blocks. When making your selection of toys for this age group, try to avoid plastic styles, as they tend to have uneven surfaces and can be difficult to stack. This can create a frustrating learning experience for the young child. High-quality blocks are available from a variety of brands, including Melissa and Doug, Maxim, and Citiblock.
Activity ideas can be planned based on two categories: divergent and convergent problem-solving skills. Divergent building block activities allow children to find a solution through trial and error until the correct working solution is identified. Puzzle building block activities are a good example of a divergent activity idea. Another example of this type of activity is Melissa and Doug’s Alphabet Nesting and Stacking Blocks. The game is designed for children ages 2 and up. The 10-piece set contains visually appealing blocks in many colors. A storage case is included with this set to help children learn that cleanliness is also an important aspect of responsible activity play. An activity idea that parents can try is to introduce their child to one or two numbers or letters of the alphabet at a time so that it is not too much so as not to overwhelm the child in initial learning.
Rolling a plastic ball to knock down stacked blocks is also an activity idea to try. As you collect and re-stack each block, you can ask your child to identify the letter number of the newly learned alphabet to improve cognitive memory. You can also count how many blocks were dropped and how many are still standing to encourage math building skills.
As children get older and find stacking blocks a simple task, move on to convergent type blocks. The convergent game involves those activities that have many options for a solution, highlighting the flexibility of creativity. Children learn to distinguish the differences between block sizes and develop physically; using his arm muscles to reach and stack, which also uses hand-to-eye coordination. Melissa and Doug’s Building Block Collection includes the “100 Wood Block Set” for ages 3 and up. This set allows the child’s imagination to be the leader and in doing so, the cognitive abilities to create abstract concepts help foster their thinking skills.
Haba’s color architectural fantasy building blocks and Melissa and Doug’s sets feature absent columns of color to help kids test their building imaginations in a no-color base block type of play. Here they can really understand and describe the difference in the form and function of each building block when stacked or placed side by side, all put to the test of their individual imagination. Brands like Citiblock present a diverse way of using flat-shaped block styles to build structures. Melissa and Doug’s Maxim toy trains and wooden unit blocks on wheels feature wheels to introduce young minds to the rolling concept of wheels.
All of these toys invite parents to participate by creating pretend play scenarios in which they can suggest a project to build, such as a house or barn. Incorporate items with the appropriate scales, such as block animals and people, to encourage your child’s ideas. Reserve story time and the building block game so your child can understand how the story unfolds using all the senses and to stimulate creativity in different narratives.
The price of the building blocks is affordable and generally inexpensive compared to other toys. And while many toys can come with bells and whistles, most tend to appeal to only one or two senses of sight and hearing, while building blocks help children to experiment cognitively, learn social skills, and carry them around in a travel without limitations.
