Posts Tagged ‘Educational Toys’
Almost everywhere you read about activating your child’s imagination begins with reading to the child. Being an active reader myself, it is easy to resort to reading stories to children. I enjoy them and appreciate the active imaginations of the authors. You can take your children off on sideroads during the reading of the book to try to imagine things hinted at by the author.
Great flights of fancy can be encouraged with statements such as, “If I had a horse, what would I do?” Open ended questions can bring new thoughts to mind in yourself and in the child. When I sometimes need to wait for a doctor appointment, for the show to start, for a ride to come, I find it makes the time much more interesting if I can think of a wonderful story I have read, or a beautiful place I have been. Picturing these images in my mind can make a rather dreary time or place turn into something beautiful, or exciting, or educational. Children’s books are a great tool for the imagination.
If you are looking for an educational toy for your child and something really interesting, look at a Big Screen Microscope. Whenever you look at something magnified you learn from it.
Whether you use a telescope, binoculars, glasses or other methods, you will learn first by magnifying things we see all of the time, like our finger, or by using a stamp pad you can explore your fingerprint. Exploration by magnifying insects is fascinating. This is a safe and fun way of experiencing life.
Ants are thought of as unified, and appear to be all working together to support their community. Watching an ant farm with all of the building and working going on can be amazing and fun to watch. Schools sometimes use an ant farm in the classroom to teach the students the fundamentals of the working of an ant colony as well as teach them what can be accomplished by working together for the common good.
An ant colony can be a small group of ants with the workers, drones, soldiers and queen. There are also large colonies of ants with millions of individuals. Ants are known for the division of labor, ability to communicate and ability to solve problems.
When you show pictures to you child it is the beginning of the formation of his imagination. Children always notice pictures first and words later. If you try to explain to a child the look of a horse, it is not nearly as interesting or formative as a picture of a horse. Some Christmas cards have pictures of a snowy landscape with a house covered with snow and lights glowing from the windows. Some will show a sleigh being pulled up to the house by a team of horses.
Telling your children a story of the snow, the cold, the home and the sleigh will be remembered and you may be asked to repeat the story from time to time. If you show the child the Christmas card and ask him to tell a story about it, you are helping him develop an imagination.
Pictures of beautiful things placed inside the mind of a child will challenge the baser things of life. The form and color of the picture as well as the detail and harmony are used to open the senses of the child.
Electronic media is not the answer to childhood learning. There are so many toys and videos offered today that claim to be educational toys or educational videos, but studies have shown that the previous methods of baby learning are just as good today as they were in the “old days.”.
Talking to your children and offering them open-ended materials to play with are still worthy activities. If you are having trouble with a subject for conversation with your child, you might try item identification. Not only the items that you find of interest, but watch what your child is looking at and give them information about that item.
Should I start my Christmas shopping in October.
Here in Alaska we are still enjoying the Autumn leaves. There is snow on the mountaintop I am looking at out of my window, but I am not ready to think about Christmas, snow, freezing temperatures. The snow will gradually come down the mountain and the days will get shorter and shorter. Then is time to think about Christmas.
Some people I know do their shopping all through the year, but I find if I purchase a present for somebody, I give it to them because I can’t wait until Christmas. I believe it is better though to have a plan for each of my children and really think about what they would like. Toys, Books, Clothing, Bedding it is hard to decide. They like them all.
Especially if we are planning to shop online, it may be better to start soon.
What do you think?
The imagination is so wonderful and with a beautiful house and the furnishings, your daughter will be wonderously satisfied for many hours. Some of the most satisfying memories of my childhood were spent when my imagination was fully engrossed on where to place the furniture in my house and what mama and daddy and all of the children were doing. The nursury and the baby were very important to me. This is a great educational toy.
Today, putting myself back into my childhood and remembering how I could imagine to that extent is difficult. We lose the ability to imagine things like that when we are older. When a child is using his or her imagination, they are expressing themselves in a very true manner and are free to be an individual with out control.