Educational Baby Toys Are a Great Foundation For Adulthood

According to early scholars, when a child is born, its mind is a tabula rasa, a clean slate. As the baby grows older, he or she accumulates learning and experiences. Even the most basic of experiences can have a great impact on your children’s growth and development. What the baby commits to his or her mind can, in one way or another, determine what he would grow up to be.

This has been shown in John Watson’s experiment with Little Albert. In the said experiment, the 9-month old Little Albert was conditioned to fear certain objects with the use of a loud noise. The conditioning was so intense that even without the loud noise, Little Albert feared the objects associated with the noise.

Learning and development in babies occur mostly in the same way. Newborn babies tend to create between what their five senses can perceive and the experiences that they have.

One of the ways by which we can stimulate the learning and development of a baby is with the use of toys. Although most people equate toys with entertainment, in reality toys provide babies with their first ever learning experience.

Baby toys can be classified into four groups – pretend toys, arts & crafts toys, construction sets, and electronic toys.

Pretend toys are those that enhance a child’s communication skills as well as imagination. It also allows them to learn the value of sharing. Examples of this type of toys are toy soldiers as well as stuff toys. Pretend toys are more suited for toddlers as well as older children. Some pretend toys usually come with small parts so care should be taken when allowing your child to play with them.

Arts & Crafts toys, on the other hand, promote muscle coordination as well as creativity and imagination. It also helps develop a baby’s color and shape recognition skill. Mobiles can be classifies as arts and crafts toys.

Construction sets are suited more for toddlers. These are toys that help develop a baby’s concentration skills. In addition to that, construction toys give your kid a taste of the basics of physics and math. Building blocks are considered to be construction toys. Since playing with building blocks also make use of and movements, it is a great way for your baby to develop eye and hand coordination as well as fine hand movements.

As the name implies, electronic toys are those that involve the use of some form of technology. Most of these toys are suited for toddlers. They help develop a number of skills such as hand and eye coordination and fine muscle movement.

For newborn babies, toys should be the colorful ones filled with different shapes. It would help if these toys move around or are accompanied by music, anything that would catch your baby’s attention. Keep in mind that newborn babies have a tendency to “lock-in” on objects that capture their fancy. Having been surrounded by a dark and cramped space for 9 months, their curiosity gets easily piqued by bright colors and movement.