Complete Guide to Select
Toddler Toys

We believe that the best toddler toys are the one which are age appropriate and support the physical, emotional, social, cognitive and language development of toddlers.

So, what are they ?

To answer this question, let's look at the developmental profile of a toddler.

Toddlerhood is a stage where young children learn to walk properly, which is typically started at about 12 month up to 36 month. You will notice that this is the time when your child becomes much more active and strives to be independent (and consequently much more stubborn too !!).

Toys which aid physical development
Toys which aid emotional and social development
Toys which aid language development
Toys which aid creativity and imagination
Toys which aid cognitive development

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Toddler toys which aid physical development.

The newly-acquired ability to walk enables toddlers to become much more active and independent than before. You will find that your toddler will love to play outside and do physical activities such as running, jumping and crawling. All these activities improve their gross motor skill.

So which child toys are suitable for aiding the development of toddler's gross motor skill ?

Toddlers will love to play with these following toys: climbing toys , toddler pull toys, toddler push toys (click here for guide on choosing push along toys), toddler riding toys (Click here for riding toys buying guide), swinging toys play tunnel, slides, rocking toys (including toy rocking horse)and balls. If you're in a tight budget, get the balls and the push toys.

Don't worry if your toddler doesn't have a good hand-eye coordination and fine motor skill yet. This type of skill will be improved later on in preschool and early elementary years. However, there is no harm for you to help your toddler to achieve a better hand-eye coordination and fine motor skill. After all, mastery of these skills are required for school, such as for writing, keyboarding, drawing, and so on.

The good news is that there are lots of fun child toys which can help to improve your toddler's fine motor skill and hand-eye coordination such as:

• stacking toys, like nesting cups ( for guide on choosing stacking cups click here), stacking rings (for guide on choosing stacking rings click here) and stacking blocks
• shape sorter.
• toddler puzzles
• simple construction toys
• toy building blocks including wooden building blocks and other kind of toy blocks.
• simple art and craft activities.
• activity center toys
• filling and dumping activities.
• pounding toys.

Toddler toys which aid emotional and social development.

Toddler is at the stage where they are still happy to play alone or, when other children are present, to play in parallel with them (instead of playing together). Almost any toy can be played in parallel with other children, especially child toys which most children have more than one, such as car toys, train toys and stuffed toys.

Teaching your toddler to share toys will improve her social skills.

Stuffed toys, be it a doll or stuffed animal, are very good toys to support emotional development of your child. They can be hugged or stroked or even talked to when your child is sad or in need of comfort, for instance during illness.

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Toddler toys which aid language development .

Good news ! You can use any toddler toy to improve your toddler's language development. The key to success lays in you as the primary caregiver. Play with your child and talk to them about the toy. For instance, you can talk about the feature of your child's doll, or introduce a lot of verb (rolling, spinning, pulling, and so on) when your child is playing with her activity center toys.

You may find it easier to talk to your child while playing with a theme play set, like barnyard animals set, doll house set, etc. This way, you can tell your child a story and let the animals or dolls in the play set illustrate it.

Finally, don't forget to read lots of kid story books to your child. This will foster the love of reading and improve the language ability.

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Toddler toys which aid creativity and imagination.

Open-ended play is the best recipe to stimulate your toddler's creativity and imagination. This is the play period where children are left to play without adult interference so that they can be in their own imaginative world. Doll, stuffed animal, construction toys toy car, toy train, and play-theme set are the best toys for this purpose.

In addition, you can give your child simple art and craft activities which are free of 'right and wrong results' and encourage an open-ended exploration.

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Toddler toys which aid cognitive development

Nowadays, there is a lot of toy designed to optimize child's brain development; they are collectively known as child educational toys. These toys will help your toddler to master these following concepts and skills: color, size, shape, basic counting, matching, sequencing and problem solving.

The generic toddler toys we recommend for this purpose are:

• stacking rings and nesting cups.
• shape sorters.
• toddler jigsaw puzzles
• stacking blocks
• construction toys
• building blocks.

Finally, household stuff can always be used to enhance pre-math capabilities and reinforce certain concepts. For instance, you can ask your child to sort socks based on color, to count the beans, etc.

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