Building with any resource is a great way for children to test their dexterity. Children learn to manipulate and build on their fine motor skills when building; especially when building to an objective.
Where building sets and building resources are different is the instructions. With building sets we are building with an objective; a finished piece that looks like the one in the instruction booklet. Of course children can still use their imagination to build something different, and that should be encouraged! But following instructions carefully and precisely is a skill that we use throughout our whole adult life; whether it’s putting together a piece of ikea furniture, checking how to cook a certain recipe, or receiving instructions from our boss, we follow instructions more than we think, whether written or verbal.
Building resources
We use many, many different types of building materials at home. Literally, we have boxes full. Here are some that we have:
- Brio builder starter set
- Blackboard blocks (that I made)
- Building flakes*
- Acrylic blocks
- Magic cubes* (remember them from school?)
- Duplo
- Lego
- These stem building disks* we have are fab
- Meccano – like this one* and others
- Plus Plus blocks*
- And countless others! If I listed them all I would be sat here all day!
Areas of development that building enhances
- Fine motor skills
- Imaginative play
- Language and communication
- Sharing
- Following instructions
- Destructive play
- Emotional development
- Mathematics – shape, space and measure
- Vocabulary building
The Brio set in particular focuses on fine motor skills and imaginative play. The set comes with basic picture instructions which could be simplified further to show a breakdown of progression through the stages.
Brio Builder Starter Set
The boys really enjoyed playing with it overall. It is a set designed for just one child as there aren’t many pieces that are included. Because there weren’t many pieces included, it meant that there was a lot of bickering over who needed/wanted a certain piece.
What building resources do you have at home?
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We were sent this item in order to write this blog post. All images and opinions are that of my own.
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