rebecca.francisco.10's Profile

I think another good thing to keep in mind is: Is the Toy Open Ended, can the kid manipulate and reinvent the toy in many different ways? Blocks are perfect open ended toys, since they can be configured into anything a child can imagine. I found your post pretty remarkable concerning open-endedness of toys, as I have had the pleasure of playing with a very similar toy to the one you used as an example, but that was very much more open-ended. It is called Build-a-Road. This toy is similar in that it follows the car-on-a-track toy concept, takes up a pretty large amount of space, and is made of thin plastic. But the thing that makes it worth the money and space to me is that the design of the track and other components is so flexible, there are infinite ways to configure and expand it. My nephew received it for Christmas this year and the kids age 4 months to 7 years, as well as all of the adults were entertained by it for days. Granted the baby couldn't manipulate it, but he sure had a good time watching everyone else! I thought I'd offer it up as a foil, in as far as a purchased, plastic toy can serve that role. Thanks for the article!