Walk into any toy store and you will see aisle after aisle filled with the latest toys. Some are electronic, some are plastic, some have every bell and whistle that you could possibly imagine. Even toys that are marketed as educational toys for kids tend to leave very little to the imagination. They talk for your child, solve problems for your child, and send your child through a predetermined course of action.
While all of these bright noisy toys seem appealing for children at first, their novelty quite often quickly wears off leaving a parent with a room filled with unused toys, and a child complaining of having nothing to do. Instead of spending hard earned dollars on the latest gadgets, why not consider purchasing wooden toys instead for your children?
There are many benefits that wooden toys offer to children over their toy aisle competitors. Wooden toys for children have been around for decades, and there are good reasons why this is the case!
- Durability- Wooden educational toys for kids are durable. They last for generations without breaking. No amount of rough play is a match for these toys! Because there are no moving parts, there are no worries about the toys breaking and becoming unusable.
Not only will these toys last throughout your child’s lifetime, they will also grow with your child. Because the toys are open ended, they can be used in many ways. The ways in which they use the toys as toddlers may look nothing like the way they use them as preschoolers or as elementary students.
- Cost-Effective: Because of their durability, this makes wooden toys a more cost-effective option as an added bonus. If you are forever spending money replacing broken toys, or buying new ones because your child has lost interest in your latest splurges, then wooden toys are a great solution. They will not need replacing, and can easily be cleaned with a little soap and water.
These toys can also be shared with siblings. Since wooden toys appeal to children of all ages, you can really get a lot of bang for your buck from investing in them. They will be able to be used by all of the children in a family and can even be passed down to future generations!
- Creativity- The beauty of wooden toys in in their simplicity. When you purchase educational toys for kids that are electronic, they basically do all the work for your child. There is very little opportunity for them to use their imaginations or creativity when playing with them.
Some wooden toys for kids are created in two dimensional geometric shapes, like circles, lines and points. Some are three dimensional geometric shapes and others are shaped like vehicles, animals or people. All of these present wonderful opportunities for creative and imaginative play, which has proven to be the best type of play for brain development.
Touching and exploring are important activities for children to partake in. Wooden toys offer them many wonderful opportunities for doing just this!
- Ecological Friendly- Wooden toys for kids are environmentally friendly, especially when compared with their plastic counterparts. With wooden toys, not only is the environment less disturbed, but also their durability makes them a much greener choice. Our landfills are already filled with plastics and other materials that will never break down, so why add another pile of broken toys into the mix? There are no batteries or electronic parts, and many fewer resources are used in their creation.
- Developmentally Appropriate- Wooden toys appeal to all of a child’s senses, and are appropriate for their developmental stage, no matter what their age is. Because they can be used in a multitude of ways, children will instinctively use them in ways which appeal to them. There is no need to worry if a wooden toy is “too old” or “too young” for your child because they will naturally use them in the ways most appropriate for them.
Also open-ended toys, such as wooden toys, have been proven to stimulate brain development in children. When children are allowed to engage in play-based learning (which is exactly the sort of experience that wooden toys for children offer), they learn about how things fit together, and how the world around them works. When children use problem-solving skills independently while playing, they learn more than they can from any toy that has a pre-prescribed curriculum.
With many toys, particularly electronic ones, children push a button and the toy recites for them. There is limited interaction, and playing with the toy is actually reducing learning to a series of rote skills learned in a passive setting. Playing with wooden toys is exactly the opposite. These are the true learning toys for kids.
- Motor Skills- In this electronic age, children are struggling more and more to develop their gross and fine motor skills. So much of their play involves sitting and pushing a few buttons while looking at a screen. Using wooden blocks and other wooden toys for kids gives them a chance to move.
Both their fine and gross motor skills are greatly improved with handling materials and using these manipulatives for their play. Motor skill development is an important trait that children will need throughout their lifetimes and it is something that needs to be developed from an early age.
When children engage in play that involves building, sorting and stacking, they are building up those tiny finger muscles as well as the muscles in their hands and arms. This will help them later as they learn to button, tie and zip. These are the muscles that they will use later in school as they begin to write, and throughout their adult lives with almost every task you can think of. Children do not receive nearly the amount of fine motor engagement that they used to in previous generations and wooden toys are a perfect platform for them.
- Safety- What would you rather have your child play with? A plastic toy that was created in a manufacturing plant, that has a lot of small parts and batteries, or a wooden toy with very few added materials? At most, wooden toys may use paint, glue or a metal screw, but when compared to the toys on the market that use electronic components, they are a much safer and less hazardous toy for your child to play with.
Many plastic toys are made with dangerous materials that are banned in several countries around the world. Wooden toys are natural and safe and are a much safer option for children to play with.
Now that you have been convinced that wooden toys are an excellent option when purchasing educational toys for kids, you are probably wondering what you should look for when purchasing them. There are a few considerations that you should make when buying any toys for your children, and most them involve their age, their interests and most importantly, their safety. This is also true for wooden toys
Like any other purchases you may make some wooden toys are superior to others. There are guidelines for what makes a truly good wooden toy that will be able to be enjoyed and loved by your children for years to come. When you are purchasing wooden toys for your children, here are some things you should consider.
Things to Consider When Buying Wooden Toys
- Consider the Wood- When buying wood toys, the very best material to look for is toys that are made from hardwood. This will provide the safest and most durable toy for your child. Hardwood toys will endure much more play without breaking or splintering than toys which are created from soft wood, or from construction scraps. Toys that are created from plywood may break after a few uses.
- Age Appropriateness- Although toys made from wood are much more appealing to and appropriate for children in a variety of age groups, there are still considerations to make about their appropriateness for your child. If the toys have a variety of small parts, you will want to be sure that your child will always play with them in a supervised setting unless they are older so that there are no choking hazards.
- Consider the Paint- Many paints that are used contain toxic chemicals. Children can absorb the toxins through their skin during play in some instances, or through their mouths (we all know that children love to put everything in their mouths!). Make sure that any paints that are used on your wooden toy purchases are made from materials that are safe for children. Vegetable based paints are the very safest options.
- Look for Splinters- Wooden toys should be smoothly sanded, so that there are no splinters or sharp edges that can injure a child. In some cases, splinters may develop after use. If the toys are created from quality woods, this should not be an issue, but in the case that it occurs, parents should sand the edges of the toy again so that their child is not injured by pesky splinters!
- Purchase Toys that Can Have Multiple Uses- If you truly want to get the most of your money, then you should look for wooden toys that can be used for multiple purposes. Although wooden toys are durable and will last for a long time, you also want to choose toys that will hold your child’s interest for many years.
Some wooden toys that are highly specific may only appeal to one gender, or children that like certain things. The more open-ended a toy is, wooden or not, the more appeal it will hold for your child through the different stages in their lives.
- Storage- Storage is a big issue for any type of toy, and wooden toys are no exception. Wooden toys, especially those with many small pieces, can hold storage challenges just like any other type of toy can.
When you decide to purchase wooden toys for your child, you should make sure that you have a plan for storage so that they do not end up scattered or lost in your child’s play area. There are toys on the market, like the Spielgaben, which have already solved this problem for you! The Spielgaben, and many other wooden toys, are sold in ready-made storage containers which solves the problem of the pieces ending up lost. If you do not purchase a wooden toy that comes with its own storage system, you will want to look for storage options.
- Space- And along with storage goes space! If you are purchasing larger wooden toys for your child, you will need to consider the amount of space you have in your home. You will need to decide if these toys will be housed in your child’s bedroom, or in a common family area like a living room or playroom. The amount of space you have will dictate how large and how many wooden toys you purchase for your child!
- Budget- The budget is a consideration in any purchase of course, but when budgeting for toys, it is a good idea to consider the long term use of the toy. If the toy is something you only expect your child to play with for a very short time, then you should not plan to spend very much money on it. If the toy is something that has long term appeal, will be used by multiple members of the household, or will be handed down, then it is definitely worth your while to consider the toy an investment. It makes a lot more sense to spend extra money buying a quality toy that will last for a long time then it does to buy one that will break quickly or that your child will lose interest in.
- Glue- It sounds like such a simple thing, but another consideration is the glue that holds these toys together if any is used. You will want to check the joints to make sure that there is not glue oozing out from them as this shows the quality of the workmanship. Also, it is a good idea to ensure that the glue used is not toxic, like carpenter’s glue. Some glue contains nasty toxic chemicals that we would not like to find in our children’s mouths!
- Appeal- Last but certainly not least, appeal is a consideration when purchasing wooden educational toys for kids. Just because a toy appeals to a parent does not mean that it will appeal to a child. Purchasing wooden dolls for instance may fail to spark an interest for some children in the same way that purchasing wooden tools or cars may do. Think about what your child is interested and if possible allow them to have some say in the selection. Of course there are many times when presenting a child with a toy may create a new interest that they never knew they had, but sometimes it does not.
Purchasing completely open ended wooden toys, like building toys, almost always appeal to children of all ages and with all interests.
Wooden toys provide children with a great number of benefits over other types of toys. When parents understand the benefits and know how to choose the toys, then they can invest in them with confidence knowing that they are providing their children with the tools they need to use their creativity and imaginations to become thinkers and problem solvers.
Happy shopping!
