The Joy of Stacking Toys in Early Childhood

Posted on July 23, 2021 by Lubica Misevski

Stacking is one of the first logical challenges your toddler will ever set for themselves. Around a year old, babies start to stack. They'll stack blocks, rings, and stuffed animals. Small children like to stack anything that has a similar size and shape - and sometimes things that don't. This is a wonderful sign of early cognitive development and creates a path to important development milestones in fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, and early mathematics. 

What Toddlers Learn from Stacking

Stacking toys give your toddler even more to explore. The littlest stackers delight in a variety of textures, weights, and nesting stack. As your toddler grows, they will develop an interest in stacking games with fun rules and group play. Watch for milestones as your baby stacks their first blocks and little towers.

Which are the best stacking toys to encourage cognitive and fine motor development? Which will be the most fun to play with and grow up with your toddler as they stack two, then three, then six blocks together? Let's explore our favourite stacking toys for any modern nursery:

Tobbles Neo Stackers by Fat Brain Toy Co

The best place to start is sensory stacking. Babies may start to stack around 12 to 18 months when their experiences are highly sensory. Toys with different textures, weights, and colours are fascinating as babies explore their senses and the difference between objects. That's what makes the Tobbles Neo stack so much fun for our littlest stacking baby or toddlers.

Each Tobble is shaped like half an egg with a soft scalloped top to make stacking easy with the added fun of nesting the different-sized pieces together. All six pieces can spin, bounce, and stack in wobbly fun towers on top of a scalloped base.

Multi-Stacking Music Set by Hape

Looking for stacking blocks and a musical toy in the same set? Hape offers a beautiful six-piece set of stacking blocks, each with its own fun musical sound.  Made from natural wood, the blocks range from big to small for fun tapered stacking. For extra joy (and musical noise when they fall down) every block is its own musical instrument. The largest block is a drum, the next a three-note xylophone. The middle block is a bell your baby can ring, then a wooden washboard block and the smallest is a little blue music block to go on top.

Your toddler can explore early music and sound development and the joy of stacking in one beautiful wooden set.

Djeco's TopAniFarm Stacking Blocks

Every toddler loves animal toys. Keeping a farmyard of animal toys often becomes practice for their very first pet. Djeco's TopAniFarm is a genius set of stacking blocks that double as little homes for animal pets. Each of these six blocks is a house for a different animal, making an adorable barnyard of friends or a stack of peek-a-boo pets looking out of their little homes.

The bottom layer is a house for a bull with a hay bale painted on the outside. The next is a doghouse for a puppy with a cute spotted eye, then a little pig-house for the pig. On top is a cute tree-house for a kitty, a bunny box for the blue rabbit and finally a little birdhouse for the hen.

Djeco Zirafa Dexterity and Memory Game

As your toddler becomes skilled at stacking, it's time to play some games! Djeco introduces a fun stacking and memory game called Zirafa. The goal is to be the giraffe with the looooongest neck. Flip cards and play the memory game to earn neck pieces. As neck pieces are earned, players are challenged to stack them onto their toy giraffe - without toppling them over. The player with the tallest un-toppled giraffe wins!

Babies and toddlers stack to learn, play, and reach their developmental milestones. Give your toddler the Stacking toys that will help them develop both cognitive and motor skills through the fun of making just about anything into a tower of toys.

You can buy stacking toys from our curated range here. 

Posted in Stacking Toys

Exploring Musical Toys for Babies, Toddlers and Beyond

Posted on July 21, 2021 by Lubica Misevski

Let's look at why musical toys are so crucial to early childhood development.

Babies notice and dance along to the music as soon as they can purposefully move their limbs. An infant can remember a melody long before they learn the meaning of words. 

It's even been proven that infants prefer the sing-song voices that parents use when talking to babies (we're not just cooing, we're singing to the baby). What this all reveals is that music is at the very heart of being a human.

Infants love music, remember melodies, and are attracted to new music as part of their natural curiosity. So it's no surprise that musical toys for babies are always a favourite in the nursery. 

The classic baby's xylophone and musical-tone toys speak more clearly to your infant and toddler than words. As little ones learn their first motor skills by grabbing, banging, and dropping, they can be learning their first musical skills a well.

Early Childhood Music and Later Success

Children who study and participate in music-making and use musical instruments when they are young tend to show clear academic advantages later in life. 

Learning beat and rhythm instils the basics of math. Playing an instrument builds fine motor skills, and playing together builds social and emotional skills. Music also connects to pneumonic learning and the physical benefits of dancing. But it all starts in the nursery.

Musical Toys for Babies and Toddlers

Music for babies and toddlers starts with the discovery of sounds. Just like finding out they have hands, infants are discovering every new thing as they put together their full understanding of the world. 

Exploring musical sounds is especially exciting, and many toddlers become music enthusiasts given instrument toys in the playroom. Which instrument toys are perfect for your baby or toddler? Let's explore some of our very favourites.

Shake Shake Shake the Animambo Wooden Set by Djeco

The best place for babies to start is something they can shake. Babies love to grab hold of an instrument that makes a noise, especially if the noise is musical. There's nothing like the look of infant delight when a rattle makes a new jingle, different from the last rattle.

The Animambo set by Djeco is the perfect shake, rattle, and roll set of musical toys for babies and toddlers alike. Enjoy this three-set of festive instruments, including a baby maraca, tambourine, and little wooden castanet, each beautifully painted on natural wood.

Hape's Pound and Tap Bench Develops With Your Baby

Children learn and grow so fast that the best toys are those that grow with your baby. The Pound and Tap Bench by Hape does precisely that. 

The toy begins as a xylophone at the bottom of a ball-hole fitting game. 

Then the pound-balls are dropped in each hole; it makes a different noise and then rolls musically down the xylophone for sound discovery play.

As your baby grows in creativity and motor skills, the xylophone can be pulled out of the pound-ball track and explored more fully with an adorable wooden mallet on the colourful track of notes.

Discover Sounds with the Multi-Stacking Music Set by Hape

Babies love sound discovery. It's why we equip them with various pots, pans, and Tupperware (and the classic wooden spoon) to discover all the different sounds that can be made. But you don't have to stop with household items. Hape has designed a beautiful sound exploratory set that goes beyond the home's pots and pans.

This six-piece box set includes a xylophone box, a drum box, a washboard box, a bell box, and more. The boxes can be stacked like blocks, and each one makes its own unique range of noises.

Music and Pet in One with the Musical Lili Lama by Manhattan Toy

Want a toy that's lovable and musical at the same time? Explore the adorable Musical Lili Llama by Manhattan Toy. 

This llama is several baby instruments in one cute, almost pet-like toy that your child can interact with, like a pretend animal friend or their favourite musical toy. 

The llama's chest has a fun spinner, its back is a 5-note xylophone, and its tail is a detachable maraca. Its ears can be pulled to use as mallets for the xylophone, and along the side are clicking gear spinners and a washboard surface. Lili is one musical llama.

If you are looking for the perfect musical toys or musical books for your baby (or a baby in the family)? Natural wood and baby xylophones are a beloved tradition that nurtures essential steps in early childhood development.

You can purchase a musical toy for your baby from 6 to 12 months and up from our carefully curated musical toys here. 

Posted in Musical Toys for Babies and Toddlers

Why Wooden Blocks Belong in Every Nursery & Playroom

Posted on July 20, 2021 by Lubica Misevski

In every nursery and daycare across the nation, you will find an ever-growing collection of wooden blocks. Why?

History and science have both shown that block play is an essential part of early child development. When children play with blocks, they are learning about the world and exploring their own ability to create. What children learn from playing with blocks starts with motor control but soon evolves into exploration, science, and creative expression. Children build, deconstruct, and build something entirely new from the same parts. They learn the weight and balance of each block and how shape influences those features. They build scenes to play pretend and obstacles to knock over.

The Developmental Benefits of Wooden Block Play

Children playing with blocks can also learn to play and build with other children, even across age-group gaps. Those encouraged to explore during block play time also learn confidence and self-starting. This is why parents and educators alike always make sure there are more than a few wooden blocks available for young children to play with. From the first time your baby starts banging and stacking all the way through school age, children have an abundance to learn and games to play when playing with blocks.

If you have a young child, a classroom, or a baby on the way then it's common to investigate which wooden blocks are the best starter kit for your child(ren)'s early development and joy in playtime. Let's explore some of the wonderfully simple and inspiring wooden block sets to start or add to your collection.

Kapla Wooden Block Planks

Planks are one of the universal shapes for construction. You can stack them on edge or flat for columns. They can become homes, towers, towns, or dinosaurs by how they are stacked. Some planks may form structures while other become the 'people'. The simple block inspires infinite adventures, which is what Kapla intended when they crafted the 200 Wooden Block Planks set. 

The perfect size for little hands of younger kids and the details constructions of bigger kids, these planks are ready to become the cornerstone (corner plank?) of a diverse collection of blocks and building toys. Kapla planks are crafted from 100% renewable pine grown in the French forests. They are safe, natural, non-toxic, and eco-friendly.

My First Maple Block Set by Hape

If you're looking for your toddler's first architectural blocks, Hape's Maple Block Set is the ideal starter kit. With 50 large and brightly coloured wooden blocks, your child will be able to explore the beginnings of block cities, rocket ships, and creative works parents can never truly predict. The Maple Block Set includes squares, rectangles, planks, triangles, and half-circles to explore the full possibilities of building and early childhood physics. Each block is finished in cheerful blue, green, red, yellow, or natural maple. This block set is perfect for babies and toddlers and pairs wonderfully with other nursery toys.

Block City: Le Toy Van's Petilou Block Set

Want to upgrade to real block city building? The Petilou 60 Piece Building Block Set was designed to turn your playroom into a block skyline. The Petilou set includes a wider diversity of block shapes, sizes, and colors to build with and comes with a handy canvas tote for quick clean-up. Watch your child build castles for toys and forts for themselves. See cities rise and fall and watch the wonderful STEM process of early architectural experiments. What falls down and what stays up? Which blocks can be balanced to make new shapes in the stack? These are the exciting lessons from a large and diverse wooden block toy set.

Magnetic Wooden Block Toys by Tegu

The one great limitation of block play is that blocks fall down. Well the Tegu brand has ingeniously come up with a solution to teach an all-new round of STEM lessons through early play: Magnetic wooden blocks. Each block has magnets embedded in the sides so they adhere to each other for bigger, better, and more spacious block constructions. The starting set is a 24 Piece Tint set. Tegu magnetic blocks are made from natural wood with safely embedded magnets and non-toxic child safe paints, with a beautiful rigid box designed to become your long-term toy storage.

Building the perfect nursery and play room is all about understanding what really matters to children's happiness and early childhood development. Simple yet infinitely possible toys like wooden blocks are the key to encouraging your child to explore their own creative power and learn naturally from the world around them.

You can shop from our carefully curated wooden blocks here.

Posted in wooden blocks

How Your Child Benefits from Sensory Play

Posted on July 13, 2021 by Lubica Misevski

Sensory play is important for the overall development of any child. Not only does sensory play support overall cognitive development and provide inclusive play for children of multiple ages and ability levels, sensory toys, from Wobble Cushions to Dimpl Sensory Toys can have a number of advantages for children of any age. 

Sensory play helps build vital nerve connections in the brain.

As your child engages with sensory activities, it can enhance the nerve connections that help facilitate spatial awareness or help your child learn more about the world around him. Sensory play can help enhance children's overall understanding of their world and give them a better idea of how they can interact with it, which can help benefit them in many ways as they grow older and continue to explore. Toys like Sensory Playfoam, for example, require a great deal of interaction and encourage awareness of different colors, different textures, and the way those textures interact with one another and with your actions. 

Sensory play helps develop knowledge of the world. 

How the world works is a mystery to particularly young children. As they interact with sensory play products, however, they often gain a better overall awareness of the world around them: how it feels, smells, and even tastes. That awareness can help better develop their connection to the world around them, enhancing fine motor skills and giving them a better idea of how things work in general. 

Sensory play can help improve tolerance.

Some children struggle more than others with some types of sensory input: specific sounds, textures, or tastes, for example. By interacting with things like sensory mats, however, many children find that they are more comfortable dealing with those textures and other stimuli over time, which can help them better interact with the world as a whole. 

Sensory play helps develop motor skills.

Many sensory play activities help enhance both fine and gross motor skills. Working with Thinking Putty, for example, can help build hand strength and encourage fine motor skills, while interacting with bubbles, sensory mats, and other large-scale sensory play items can help build gross motor skills, including improving balance and situational awareness. 

Sensory play can help enhance mindfulness and build calm.

Sensory activities are often very grounding, especially those that incorporate multiple senses. Through those grounding exercises, you can help your child feel more connected to the world around him and enhance his sense of calm. In many cases, engaging in regular sensory activities can help encourage your child to calm himself and even provide new calming rituals that can help during temper tantrums and meltdowns.

Sensory play encourages creativity.

Many sensory play toys, from putties and doughs to blocks, mats, and more, help encourage creativity in play. Many of those toys do not have specific structures that children must follow in order to play with them effectively. Instead, the sky is the limit--and children can explore all of those options in one easy-to-access toy or location. They can pull, twist, squish, and play--and all of those play types are considered acceptable and even desirable. 

Are you looking for sensory play items that can help enhance your child's development, encourage creativity, and put your child in a better position to learn and grow? We have a wide range of sensory toys that can help build those vital skills, encourage development, and even help calm your child.

Check out our collection or contact us today to learn more about the many benefits of sensory play and how it can help at every stage of your child's development.

Posted in Sensory Toys

The Benefits of Playing with Plus-Plus Blocks

Posted on July 09, 2021 by Lubica Misevski

Plus-Plus Blocks offer hours of exciting play for kids. If your child can imagine it, they can build it! Plus-Plus Blocks come in a variety of packs, from a neon pack filled with different colours to allow your child a world of creativity to building packs that will help give your child a place to start as they work on a variety of different projects, including robots, mermaids, and princesses. For smaller hands, Plus-Plus Big can offer amazing creative problem-solving and building fun. 

Plus-Plus Blocks are an incredible STEM toy that offer many advantages to your young learners. 

Encourage Fine Motor Skills

Whether you're offering Plus-Plus Big to your 1 to 6-year-old children or pulling out a regular Plus-Plus Blocks kit for older kids, including kids ranging from 5-12, they're ideal for encouraging fine motor skills, which are critical for a child's overall development, progress, and even school success.  Fine motor skills are vital for writing or engaging in a variety of artistic activities--and Plus-Plus Blocks are designed to help encourage them. They provide encouragement for children to sit down and put together small pieces in a variety of shapes. As their fine motor skills improve, they'll be able to put together more complex designs, which can help feed their desire to further improve those skills. 

Build Spatial Awareness

Like fine motor skills, spatial awareness is vital for growing children. Plus-Plus Blocks fit together in a variety of ways, snapping together to form fantastic sculptures of anything your child can imagine. In order to put together those amazing constructions, however, your child will need to learn how the Blocks interact with one another to form those shapes and patterns. 

Spatial awareness can help your child learn how to interact with his entire environment. He'll learn how small pieces fit together, what elements make them work together, and how to manipulate them in order to achieve his goals--and he'll do it all with one easy-to-master toy that will encourage creative thinking. 

Build Creativity

Each Plus-Plus pack comes with idea cards that can help get your child started down that creative journey, but the uses for each block kit do not stop there. Through interaction with Plus-Plus Blocks, your child can build better creative skills. Plus-Plus Blocks offer a huge range of creative options. Your child can then take that creativity to other areas of his life, including school, home, and even future work opportunities. 

Enhance Problem-Solving Capability

Plus-Plus Blocks can be manipulated into a wide range of shapes and patterns, but it takes time and effort to learn how to manipulate them. Not only does that require creativity, it requires problem-solving capability--and it teaches it in a way that is fun and exciting for your child. As she puts together Plus-Plus Blocks in a variety of shapes, buildings, and constructions, your child will become increasingly adept at managing problems and figuring out how to address them quickly. That enhanced problem-solving capability can help your child feel more confident when addressing future issues and problems, provide her with the patience needed to stick it out when she's struggling, and build her willingness to try creative solutions, even when, on the surface, they don't seem to work as well as she had first hoped--because that creative solution could be just around the bend.

If you're looking for an excellent STEM toy to help encourage creativity and build your child's skills, Plus-Plus Blocks offer a wide range of opportunities to explore. Check out our extensive collection of options today to learn more about how they can benefit your child.

Dimpl Digits by Fat Brain Toys: Enhancing Fine Motor Skills and Number Recognition

Posted on April 08, 2021 by Lubica Misevski

From their earliest days, playing with the right toys is critical for your child's development. Choosing the right toys can help your child develop learning and problem-solving skills that can carry them through school and beyond, enhancing brain development and setting them up for success. Choosing high-quality toys can help improve your child's cognitive processing skills and provide them with the assistance and skills they need in order to succeed in many areas of life, from education to future job opportunities. 

Like many of the toys in the Fat Brain Toys line, Dimpl Digits helps your child learn several critical developmental skills as they explore the world around them. 

Dimpl Digits Provides a Tactile Sensory Experience

Each wedge in the bright colour wheel contains a bubble that children can press, creating a soft popping sound. They can then flip it over and pop the bubbles all over again, providing them with a fun sensory experience that they'll be slow to put down. Each silicone bubble has a different raised number, creating a unique texture under your child's fingers. This tactile exploration is a great way to keep little hands busy no matter where you are: waiting in line, playing in the floor at home, or taking a trip in the car. Tactile exploration is also a great way to help older kids pay attention to the task at hand, giving them an outlet for their energy and allowing them to focus more effectively on listening to instructions, lessons, or parental input.

Bright Colours Encourage Visual Development and Colour Recognition

The Dimpl Digits toy forms a full colour wheel that will be sure to light up your child's eyes and encourage colour recognition skills. Your child will love learning to identify the different colours as they handle them and name them for you. The bright colours will also encourage colour appreciation and catch your child's attention. 

Dimpl Digits Can Enhance Fine Motor Skills

Fine motor skills are critical for many stages of your child's development. With Dimpl Digits, your child won't realize that they're learning--but they'll develop those vital fine motor skills nonetheless. Improved fine motor skills can make it easier for your child to write, cut, and handle fine tactile motions. As your child manipulates the silicone bubbles in the Dimpl Digits toy, they will have the chance to naturally improve those skills, all while enjoying a fun tactile experience. 

Help Your Child Learn Counting and Number Recognition

Like many of the toys in the Fat Brain line, Dimpl Digits does not just serve a single purpose. It also serves to encourage children to learn number recognition and counting skills. Each little silicone bubble has a different number on it from one to ten. As your child plays with Dimpl Digits, he/she can run his/her fingers over those numbers or take a look at them directly. Encourage number recognition as you play with your child by encouraging him/her to touch a specific number or to count his/her way around the circle. 

Choosing the right toys for your child can make an immense difference in overall development. Dimpl Digits is designed to help enhance fine motor skills, encourage colour awareness, and improve number recognition, all in a convenient, easy-to-carry form that your child will be eager to play with. Whether your child needs a toy to use as a distraction when you're out and about or your child needs a new toy to add to your home collection, Dimpl Digits will be sure to fit your needs. Purchase Dimpl Digits today to help encourage your child on his/her learning journey.

Posted in Dimpl Australia, Dimpl Digits Australia, Dimpl Digits Fat Brain Toys, Fat Brain Toys Australia, Fidget Toys

Dimpl Stack by Fat Brain Toy Co: Enhancing STEM Skills from a Young Age

Posted on April 07, 2021 by Lubica Misevski

As the parent of a young child, you may already be aware of the need to provide your child with access to STEM materials and toys. By providing your child with STEM development toys, you can enhance those critical science, math, and technology skills, allowing your child to start to explore the world in a new way and encouraging development in those areas. 

The Dimpl Stack by Fat Brain Toy Co is an excellent way to start enhancing STEM skills from a young age, allowing your child to explore the world around them and providing him/her with much-needed sensory exploration that will help with brain development. 

Stacking and Snapping

The Dimpl Stack contains five separate stacking cups topped by a silicone bubble, which children can press and play with as they work to stack the cups. Each cup is a little bit smaller in size. While your child can use several methods to stack the cups together, ultimately, the cups fit together best when stacked in ascending size order. Your child can learn vital building and engineering skills--all without realizing that he's/she's doing any such thing. With each cup the tower grows, the more confident your little one will become in his/her building skills. Your child will also have the chance to test the cups on different surfaces, learning how they interact with the cups to create a more effective structure. Will the cups stack better on carpet or on hard flooring? Will stacking them on a high chair tray help him/her get them higher? You might already know the answer, but for your little one, those explorations open up a whole new world of exciting STEM skills and interactions. 

Enhanced Fine Motor Skills

Fine motor skills are incredibly important for little ones, and providing them with toys that can help develop those skills can help encourage and guide them as they move forward with their structures. The cups in the Dimpl Stack are the ideal size for little hand to grasp and stack. As your little one stacks those cups together, he/she will learn more about how to carefully manipulate objects and get a better idea of how they interact with one another and the environment around him/her. As his/her fine motor skills improve, he/she will more consistently be able to build the tower to greater heights--then knock it over for a new sensory experience and a lesson in cause and effect.

Tactile Exploration

An important part of learning and growing, not just in STEM fields, but in overall development, is using the senses to explore the world. Your little one will engage with toys with hands and mouth. Dimpl Stack provides the perfect tactile experience. Your little one will learn that when he/she presses down on the soft silicone button at the top of the Dimpl Stack cups, it pops inward. When he/she reaches in from the other side, it will pop back out again. Not only that, he/she will have the chance to explore the different textures of cup and button: hard plastic on the cups, with a softer texture on the top. Each silicone button also has its own unique pattern, which will help provide your child with the experience he/she needs to connect further with the world around him/her.

Are you looking for a toy that will help your child learn and grow?

Dimpl Stack may provide exactly the sensory, tactile stimulation your child needs. Check out the Dimpl Stack product page today to learn more about its features and how it can benefit your child's growth and development, or make a purchase now to allow your child to start playing as soon as possible.

Posted in Fat Brain Toys Australia, Fat Brain Toys Dimpl Stack, Stacking Toys, STEM Skills for Young Kids