What Cognitive Stimulation Does The Toy Provide?

Did you know that LEGOs can boost young children’s engineering skills (MIT School of Engineering)? It’s true! Studies show that LEGOs can prove important for developing skills used later in life. From pink, to blue, to long or thick, LEGOs are building blocks that come in all colors, shapes and sizes. With dots on the top, and holes on the bottom, LEGOs are designed to interlock enable to form structures. LEGOs help many young children develop skills such as early engineering, fine motor skills, an creativity.

From the age of seven to about eleven, children become capable of performing mental operations or working through problems and ideas in their minds. However, they can perform operations only on tangible objects and real events. Children also achieve conservation, reversibility, and decentration during this stage:

Children can classify and order, as well as organise objects into series. The child is still tied to the immediate experience but within these limitations can perform logical mental operations. For example, can solve mental problems using counters and objects.

Pre-operational stage (toddler and early childhood) is demonstrated through the use of symbols, language, matures, memory and imagination are developed but thinking is non-logical.

Mildred Parten and Jean Piaget are two theorists that have had great influences on the way we understand children. Piaget constructed the idea that a person’s thinking passes through four stages and as the person grows, their way of thinking changes thus entering a different stage. He emphasized mostly the preoperational stage, which is for ages two to seven years old. In this stage children are seen as illogical thinkers but they do engage in make-believe games by using objects for purposes other than their actual intended use. Between the ages of four and seven, they still do not think logically but they become interested in games that have rules, structure, and social interaction. Unlike Jean Piaget, Mildred Parten did not see types of

Toys play an important role in childhood development as children learn roles and skills from playing. As a result, the toys children are subjected to have an affect on which roles, interests, and skills are learned and practiced. Through Lego’s product Duplo, I will demonstrate the influence particular gendered toys have on children and their performance of traditional gender roles. Gender, which is a learned performance, is something society has been taught from a very early age and toy advertising has played a significant role in reinforcing the performance. One tradition that is reinforced and naturalized by society is the ideology of a male dominated society, representing strong characteristics of heterosexuality and masculinity; also known as hegemonic masculinity. Therefore, using Ideological Criticism, I will analyze how through the branding and design of Lego’s Duplo toys, children have been constructed to do gender differently, ultimately perpetuating and reinforcing hegemonic masculinity.

The Laugh and Learn™ Learning Basketball is a developmental toy designed by Fisher-Price. Essentially the toy is a basketball hoop as well as corresponding stand that will adjust as the child grows, and is recommended by the website for ages six to thirty-six months. Additionally, the basketball hoop has the numbers one through five on it, as well as automated hands and a face which smiles as it plays one of twelve possible songs. The basketball toy is made out of a hard plastic and it includes every color of the basic rainbow (red, orange, yellow, green, purple and blue) The toy is also equipped with two smaller basketballs (which are not as rigid as their life-sized counterparts) which the child can put through the hoop

This toy is connected to information processing because this theory states that memory grows with age and experience. The more the child hears the noises associated with the picture of the animal, the more likely it will be permanently stored in their long-term memory. Core-knowledge theorists believe that language is a specialized domain of knowledge therefore, it comes more naturally to children. So, one thing a parent could suggest to enhance their child’s cognitive development is to have the child repeat the sound out loud and then say what animal it is associated with. Due to the fact that language comes more easily to children, talking out loud can help the child learn the noises each animal makes and keep it in their long-term

The types of toys children play with can affect how they develop. Toys can help or hinder a child’s development in intelligence, social skills and personality. Certain characteristics may be genetically entwined in a human being, but some characteristics and behaviors can be learned, from parents, surroundings, and the toys with which a youngster plays. Elise Moore, author of “How Do Toys Aid Development”, stated “if play is the work of the child, toys are the child’s tools” (Moore, 2).

Cognitive: starting to explore pretend play in the home corner or with small world toys, they become interested in mark making and painting and books.

In the nursery, I examined toys aimed at the sensorimotor stage of cognitive development. This stage includes actions based on reflexes and the transition to actions based on intentions. Actions that are satisfying are repeated by the child through a process called primary circular reactions. Soon after this first stage, the child moves on to the secondary circular reactions or actions that have an effect on the environment. After experiencing both of these kind of reactions, the child then advances into more intentional actions. The child begins to have goal-directed behavior and curiosity which leads to experimenting. Lastly, the child will begin to understand symbolic problem solving and object permanence.

Piaget believed everyone had to go through each stage of development. Although some kids may show characteristics of more than one stage at a time, he was certain that cognitive development always followed the sequence of the stages, stages cannot be skipped, and each stage is marked by new intellectual abilities and more complex understandings of the world. With this experiment I will prove how each toy can improve, or dismantle each stage for children. While in the toy store I watched how kids were interacting with one another, and how they handled some of the toys. Having, a niece, nephew, and Godson who are infants it was easier to find

The age range I have chosen is 3-7 yrs and I will discuss intellectual development. The main stages of intellectual development as defined by Jean Piaget for children aged 3-7 yrs are classified under the “Preoperational Stage” the second stage of four in his cognitive development theory. Piaget states that children between the ages of 3-7 yrs continue to explore their environment and develop their thinking from their experience. They use mental imagery and begin to represent their thinking symbolically through language and the symbolic use of objects, such as using a doll to represent a baby. They tend

There are many different things that shape the cognitive development of children. To begin with cognitive development is when a child develops how to process, solve problems, and start making decisions. Once they have learned this they take everything they have learned into their adolescence. An example, of what can shape the cognitive development of a child can be an educational game. Educational games can be very useful in shaping a child’s development because they are having fun while learning at the same time and what kid doesn’t like to play games, the fact that it is even educational makes it even better for them. Not only are they having fun but there are many different games that help in different categories of development in

“ CBS News suggest that parents choose toys for their toddlers and preschoolers that teach skills because a young child’s brain will grab hold of these permanent marks and carry through with them all the way to adulthood.” (Halter) These playthings not only teach skills, but confidence, because they learn to enjoy accomplishing any task they face. Many say educational toys are the best way to go because it stimulate tools a child will use throughout their schooling.