Play, Plaything, and Playground Good For Your Children

Playing enhances psychomotor (ability to use both the body and mind in doing activity), emotional quotient (decision-making skill, discipline, right attitude and ability to come up with appropriate actions whatever life will bring), intelligence quotient (verbal and logic reasoning and sound mathematical skills), and socialization skill (teamwork and ability to get along well with others).

In animal kingdom play done by the juvenile predators is usually associated with harnessing and developing hunting skill, while the hunted prey young ones would usually improve their stealth and defensive skill to stave off inevitable attacks. Play also can be a sort of exercise for these young animals to strengthen their bodies and to get socialized with their own kind. Children who didn’t enjoy their childhood, and deprived of toys and chance to play will most likely exhibit inferiority complex, lack of confidence, shyness and inept socialization skills.

For children who are still taking elementary and secondary education, play will help induce camaraderie and rapport with their friends, and keep their mind sharp and body strong.

For toddlers and elementary students, we must always find ways to bond well with them like playing with their toys or perhaps join them on their games like pretending to be invisible, an animal, vehicle or even a horrible and fearsome monster, hehehe, with complete sound and animation effects or simply hide and seek. You may think of other exciting games to capture the attention and interests of your kids; sometimes it takes thinking out of the box and creativity to do this.

Here are some tips in buying toys for your beloved kids if you have little time being with your kids or not fond of child's play:

- Choose toys appropriate to the age of your kids. Read carefully the labels on the toys packages to know if the toys you are purchasing is suited to your child’s age.

- Toys should be tough and durable enough to withstand wear and tear, child friendly and should get the interest of your kids. You can settle for the affordable toys yet can boost your child’s imagination and creativity.

- Before buying make sure the toys are easy to play with, not noisy, its weight is in right proportion to your kid(s) and will not cause any irritation.

- Is the toy safe? Avoid toys with removable parts these could be a choking hazard and also those toys that have sharp edges.

- Solicit suggestions from other parents about picking the right toys for your kids. Choices of toys must encourage learning.

Here are some suggested toys that your kids might like and love.

BLOCKS –Young babies can be given these types of toys for as long as they can be able to grasp them, shape sorter cube and form fitters are great picks.

MUSIC SET – best for babies and toddlers, music sets will surely help them get familiar and acquainted with the different sounds. Guitars, mini pianos, microphones, animal music players, and cellphones with different effects, will surely captivate them.

WALKERS, TRIKES and MINI-BIKES. Older babies and toddlers would love to move from one place to another, these mobile toys will surely give your babies and toddlers a nice way to move around and improve their motor skills.

- You might visit toys section of malls like Toys R Us to see and purchase nice toys for your kids.

- For elementary to high school students. Try to purchase board games such as chess, scrabble, monopoly and the likes, these will help enhance and nurture the thinking ability of your children and develop their vocabulary and even reasoning skills. Studies conducted in US will reveal that the accumulated average grades of kids playing chess are better than the overall average grade of those kids that doesn’t play this game.

- Expose and encourage your kids to get involved with sports like basketball, volleyball, table tennis, ice hockey, football and other interesting sports that are beneficial in the development of the socialization skills of your kids as well as giving them opportunity to experience the value of winning and losing, preparation, discipline, teamwork, hardwork and resilience.

- Computers loaded with educational games can also be beneficial to your children.

: ) My 19th entry to the hubchallenge...