Toys can determine the personality of the child in future. War toys, isolationist or competitive during childhood influence the education of the child and can even foment aggressive conducts and communication problems. A study supervised by the professor of the department of Self-Expression Through Music, Plastic Art and Movement of the University of Granada, José Luis Conde, deals with all these aspects from the perspective of education and reveals some of the characteristics toys for children between 1 and 6 should have to prevent behaviour problems in the adult age.
According to Conde, the first stage of the child is essential in his future development, and therefore “it is so important for parents to choose the appropriate toys and understand that toys can not replace the time they have to spend with their children”. In this sense, the professor of the UGR remembers that children spend more and more time alone with their toys, the TV or before the computer screen, and this situation can generate communication problems in future: “You can not ask a teenager to be extrovert and communicative if these values have not been encouraged as a child in his education. It also happens with other aspects like aggressiveness, violence, racism or sexism. What the child watches or consumes affects his personal development without doubt”.
Made-to measure- toys
When parents or relatives want to buy a toy for a child they must consider many aspects. “It must be adapted to their evolutionary needs, encourage his creativity and imagination, be stimulating, entertaining and safe, and above all, the child must be satisfied”, says Conde, after saying that “in many occasions, people buy toys because adults like them, they are fashionable, or are the most expensive (exchange currency for the time adults do not spend with the child) without taking into account if children are really going to like it and they are going to be really educational for them”
Other elements suggested by the educator to the parents are safety, compliance with the rules established by the European Union, resistance, and it must be stimulating, versatile, different and, above all, appropriate to the evolutionary process of the child: “Every age of the child requires a different king of game and it is very important to take it into account to help to the good development of the child”.
Evolution and development
Likewise, the different stages of childhood require specific characteristics that have also been included in the study through a toy guide. The supervisor of the project discloses some of such and explains that these analyses are especially aimed at children aged between 1 and 6. During the first year the child experiences the strongest development and starts to be interested in the world that surrounds him, so toys must help him to discover his own body and senses through rattles, mobiles, rings or play mats. Since the seventh month, when the exploration of the environment still is essential, it is good for children to play with plastic toys such as balls, rings, rocking toys or sonorous toys. When they are one year old they start to walk and identify the properties of the objects, and it is therefore advisable that they use toys that stimulate and strengthen movement, balance and manipulation.
Since the second year of life it is good to introduce children to representative games, and therefore kitchenettes, fancy dresses, construction toys, supermarkets and garages are advisable, as well as others that require certain concentration like puzzles, jigsaws, magnetic blackboards and children stories. When children are three or four years old they are in the age of animism, symbolic games and socialization, and he should play with tricycles or bicycles with supports, scooters, balls, fancy dresses, dolls, small cars and toys to develop memory and attention such as cards, children dominos and painting and modelling tools.
But these are not the only functions toys must have during childhood. Conde insists that another effect must be co-education, in such a way that since the beginning, irrespective of their sex, they must not be ashamed to push a stroller, play kitchen, vacuum, sweep or play with cars or dolls to accept equality since childhood as something logical and normal. “If we establish differences between children with regard to the toys and the activities both sexes must carry out, it will be very difficult as adults to become aware that those differences should not exist”, he says.
Besides this research work, the professor of the department of Didactics of Self-Expression through Music, Plastic Art and Movement organizes since two years a toy fair in the Faculty of Education Sciences to favour parent and children’s education in this sense. They install four showcases with used non-war toys collected by the students of this Faculty, and children can acquire them by leaving there one of their toys. Besides its didactic labour, the fair also has a caring objective, as every year toys are donated to organizations that collaborate with the University of Granada in different projects of cooperation and development.
Reference
Prof José Luis Conde Caveda
Dpt. Didactics of Self-Expression through Music, Plastic Art and Movement
Tel. 958 244 271 / 958 243 954 (department)
E-mail. jconde@ugr.es
