Toys that Aid in Your Child’s Development

As a child grows up, you need to actively take measures to ensure their development is not obstructed in any way. One way to do this is to provide them with toys that are educational in nature and enable better development of gross motor skills, fine motor skills, cognitive abilities, and emotional understanding.

Improving the Gross Motor Skills

Children need to develop their gross motor skills, which refer to their sense of coordination and balance, hard work, and recognition and interaction with their surroundings. Such skills can be honed through outdoor play sets such as the ones mentioned below:

Coco Egg Cup: This is an intriguing and an interesting outdoor portable play set that will help your child to develop their gross motor skills.

Race Car: This is a manual car without pedals; something similar to the car used by Fred Flintstones. It enables your child to utilise the muscles of their lower body such as the thighs and legs in order to move the car. It helps in improving their balancing and coordination skills as well.

Improving the Fine Motor Skills

image:goodtoplay.com

Fine motor skills refer to the use of the fingers, hands, and wrists with the eyes to coordinate the manipulation and movement of objects. They can be improved with the following toys:

Xylophone: It is a musical instrument, which aids in developing and improving the fine motor skills through the coordination of the wrists and fingers along with the eyes. It also enhances visual targeting and analysis of the child.

Spades: It is a traditional toy that helps children in honing their fine motor skills through the use of their hands and fingers. They also learn to work on their problem-solving and decision-making skills, as they need to decide the shape to put the sand into.

Block Toys: These colourful toys with varying colour patterns engage a child’s visual capabilities as well as hone their fine motor skills.

Cognitive Development

Cognitive development refers to the development of a child’s cognitive skills including the memory, sensory, thinking, and grasping abilities. They can be enhanced through the following toys:

Croquet: It involves hitting wooden or plastic balls through a hoop with a mallet. The balls are of various colours; this fosters a child’s visual tracking capabilities that improve their cognitive skills.

Puzzles: Djeco puzzles trigger the cognitive and motor skills at the same time; this is because puzzles force a child to use their problem-solving and critical thinking capacities, thus enhancing their memory retention and improving their identification of different shapes.

Emotional Development

The emotional development of a child is very important; when they play with their peers, they develop self-confidence, a sense of individuality and belonging, and their social skills. They also learn to be considerate with others. The following toys can be useful in this venture:

Plush Toys: When a child plays with a plush toy, they develop a sense of nurturing and caring because they pretend to take care of their toy.

Stand-up Figures: These stand-up figures consist of different emotional expressions that spark the development of several different types of emotions in children. 

FYI, when you need help to solve addiction problem in your family, visit UKAT -UK Addiction Treatment Centres- to know more about their free 24/7 confidential helpline.

Sources 
http://www.friendshipcircle.org/blog/2013/02/25/8-great-toys-that-help-with-cognitive-development/

http://www.friendshipcircle.org/blog/2013/01/14/8-toys-that-can-help-a-child-with-emotional-development/
http://www.fundamentallychildren.com/good-toy-guide/toys-by-skill-developed/personal-social-emotional-development/

http://www.babycenter.com/0_toys-that-boost-physical-development_3659016.bc