Wooden toys - do children actually find them fun?

[Anon778833]

Or are they mainly about making ‘sustainable’ life choices?

A lot of them look boring to me. But fully prepared to be told I’m wrong...

thevanguard what an awesome nursery teacher he would have been!! I love the things he writes.

@thevanguardsix I love the way you write about your children. I can feel your admiration for them oozing through your words.

Also, I love One Hundred Toys, and love it even more now!

Thanks for replies. I remember a thread where people were saying that some children who weren’t allowed plastic toys felt deprived.

I have a 9 month old and I’ve tried not to buy too much plastic stuff because it does look a mess. You see so many pictures with those wooden rainbows in but I reckon they are mainly house decorations 😉

There’s no point being completely anti plastic. Duplo, lego and Magna tiles are amazing activities for a start! Just be anti throw away toys, anti things being too single purpose.

DS is now two and come to think of it, he does have a lot of wooden toys and that’s what he plays with most. Current favourites include the train set, alphabet puzzles and a collection of wooden vehicles. He also went through a big phase of enjoying his wooden kitchen and wood&velcro chopping veg.

I don’t think he played with that many toys at 9 months - definitely enjoyed (plastic) bath toys and looking at books and a few other things but not nearly as many as he plays with at 2.

We've got a rainbow toy (cheap knock off on ebay) that gets used for everything. Garage for the toys, pen for the animals, bed for a much loved cuddly toy....

Like everything it's a balance really. I cant see wooden hoover food lego catching on any time soon though.

My Gdcs have that wooden toy with the little peg people that bounce out of holes - a dd of mine had exactly the same thing! It’s brilliant IMO - except for the peg people rolling under the sofa...

I still have the coloured wooden blocks in various shapes and sizes that were dd1’s - she played with them a lot, and learned basic colours from them. Gdcs have enjoyed them too.

Another wooden toy that has gone down well with Gdcs is a Noah’s Ark. And a London bus type thing, with lots of little peg passengers who fit into round ‘seats’.
I do think wooden things need to be in bright cheerful colours, though. For me you can keep any that aren’t.

We have both, although I’ve made a conscious effort to try and buy plastic from charity shops rather than new. The wooden toys do look pretty but I find once they get played with half the pieces get moved around the house and end up lost, so the nice rainbow effect is gone! People who have them on display looking lovely must never let their children touch them!

Thanks for replies. I remember a thread where people were saying that some children who weren’t allowed plastic toys felt deprived
I think that's because there's a certain type of parent who can't just do things differently, they have to have a good old sneer and make it clear their way is better.

You see it with the hardline 'my child couldn't possibly have plastic toys, eugh how uninspiring. My DC have to have artisan wooden toys and frolics in the woods in only expensive sustainably sourced clothing' types.
Equally you get the mocking 'you're so foolish for spending money on wooden toys, believe me you might think your child enjoys them but at playgroup they'll be the first to go to the plastic toys and suddenly your smug wooden toy claims don't work' (usually referring to a playground with only plastic toys, which surely a parent wouldn't take their child to if they hated plastic).

When people are insecure in their own choices, they have to bring other people down.

It depends on your children too - one of mine is keener on blocks and brio than the other. One of our most used toys in our house is a vtech apple computer that does phonics and songs - it's dragged out practically daily along with a plastic keyboard that is much loved but then so is brio and wooden blocks still.

I'll be over here sat on the fence getting splinters

DD loves her wooden toys, especially Brio.

I think there are some unavoidable plastic toys like Duplo and Playmobil but I try to buy these things second hand to reduce the impact a little.

Have never owned a Grimm's rainbow, but at playgroups/people's houses, DS1 ignored it, DS2 plays with it.

What they both prefer though is any toy with wheels. Wooden, metal, rubber or plastic. They don't care.

Wooden toys are great. Some old wooden toys can be worth a lot nowadays. My late grandfather made wooden toys for me when I was a child, and my own two children played with them years later. It makes me cringe when you see so many hideous coloured plastic toys available now, sometimes very large items, that get abandoned in gardens and fill up the rooms in the house, then thrown out as scrap later.