In today’s fast-pasted, electronic world, it’s easy to forget about the simple things that we as parents can do to help our children learn and develop. Wooden puzzles might seem old-fashioned and boring compared to flashy video games, but don’t be fooled; playing with wooden puzzles is a top-notch way to help your child develop their minds and fine motor skills.
Choose the Right Puzzle
Before you rush out to buy every puzzle in the store, it’s important to keep a few things in mind. Children learn best when they are challenged enough to make it interesting but quickly lose interest if the puzzle is well beyond what they can handle. Start with puzzles that will be relatively simple for your child to solve, and then work your way up from there.
Infants and young toddlers will enjoy doing simple tray puzzles where the goal is to place one piece into the correctly shaped hole. You can add interest by finding puzzles that make sounds or play music, but even simple puzzles will be enjoyable. Once, they’ve mastered these simple puzzles, you can introduce wooden picture puzzles – the ones that come in a tray are best for beginners and are also easier to keep neat and tidy. Giant floor puzzles and simple cardboard puzzles can be added as your child’s skills grow.
What Your Child Will Learn
Even the simplest tray puzzle meant for babies involves a lot more skill than it appears at first glance! Here are a few of the skills that your child will start to master as he or she works on puzzles:
- Spatial temporal reasoning. Figuring out which piece goes where and rotating it to fit is a wonderful workout for your child’s spatial abilities. Strong spatial skills are critical in adult life for everything from learning how to drive to being successful in a wide range of careers such as engineering and architecture.
- How to use trial and error to solve problems. Children who have the opportunity to make – and correct – mistakes learn an important lesson in problem solving. Each mistake is an opportunity to learn more and to apply that knowledge to finding a workable solution. Children who learn to be persistent and how to incorporate new knowledge as they work on problems will have the skills they’ll need to achieve their goals in life.
- Fine motor skills and hand eye coordination. Rotating each puzzle piece and placing it just so is quite a feat! The more time a child spends on tasks that exercise his or her fine motor skills the better. This practice will make writing, typing and other tasks that rely on strong motor skills much easier to learn.
- Sharing and responsibility. Doing puzzles with friends, siblings or other family members requires quite a bit of cooperation and taking turns. Often, it’s also an exercise in learning how to manage frustration gracefully! Because puzzles become useless if the pieces are lost, children get a lesson in why it’s important to put things away and how to take care of their things.
When it comes times to purchase new toys for your children, don’t forget about classics like wooden puzzles. They might not be as flashy as an electronic tablet or handheld video game but they deliver a lot of entertainment and educational value for a very reasonable price.
As a father of five, Jacob Maslow has learned quite a bit about buying toys! He currently works as a marketing director for Today’s Concept, which sells a wide range of household items including the award winning Melissa and Doug toys, puzzles and games.
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