I work ten-hour days Tuesday through Friday, so I am off every Monday. That is my day with my grandkids. My grandson and I run errands, go to lunch, and generally gallivant around. That often includes a trip to Sam’s Club and a new toy. Today was no different. While we walked up and down the toy aisle, we tried to agree on something he wanted that I was willing to buy. As I extolled the virtues of building blocks and hot wheels, my three-year-old grandson said something to me that got me thinking. He said, “But, Grandma, those toys don’t DO anything. They’re boring.” It occurred to me my grandson wanted to be entertained. He did not want toys he had to play with; he wanted toys that did something to entertain him.
That conversation with my grandson made me wonder if this is common. Are we creating a generation of children who don’t know how to play? I asked a few friends – certainly not a large sampling – but it seems they have seen the same thing with their kids or grandkids, with a few exceptions. My generation and, to a large extent, the generations who are now young parents grew up with different toys than youngsters have now. We had to make up stories for our dolls, build things with blocks, or make racetracks for our motorless toy cars. Children now have dolls who can respond and speak, cars they can sit in and drive, and thousands of games and entertainment at their fingertips.
I sometimes think, as adults, we believe kids innately know how to play and create fun. But that isn’t true. Kids need to be taught how to use their imaginations. Creativity is the building block of critical thinking. Like so many skills, children are born with the ability to imagine and create, but they need guidance to use that skill. So can you teach your preschooler how to play and imagine? YES!
How do you encourage your preschooler to use their imagination?
- Expose your child to different kinds of music, and encourage them to connect with it. Kids can connect with music by becoming a part of it through rhythm instruments, clapping, dancing, or drawing what the music makes them feel. Use an empty water bottle and put colorful marbles in it (be sure to glue the top on). Let your child shake the bottle to the rhythm of the music. Studies show that exposure to music, developing rhythm, and dancing all increase cognitive function in young children. Take this one step further, and talk to your children about how the music made them feel. Give them the language to describe their feelings. The bonus is that children with the language to express themselves experience less frustration!
- Make art of household bits and pieces. Do you remember making puppets out of brown paper lunch bags? I sure do – and I loved it! Get a pack of brown paper bags and look around your house for scraps of material, yarn, buttons, crayons…anything colorful. Let your child glue things onto the bags to make puppets. Encourage them to make funny faces or animal faces on the bags. Then have funny conversations with the puppets or make up songs the puppets “sing.”
Let’s teach our grandchildren how to create…how to make up stories for their dolls, toy dinosaurs, or play cars. These activities aim to get your child using their creativity and imagination to express themselves.
As Albert Einstein said: “Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination embraces the entire world.”
TRICIA VLASAK is a mother and grandparent. She works in law enforcement when she isn’t writing about parenting, hiking with her dogs, or going on adventures. Tricia received a Gold Award for personal essay from Parenting Media Association in 2022.
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