Do you know that interlocking blocks can be used as a powerful learning tool and help children to develop their:
- Imagination
- Mathematics
- Self expressions
- Self esstem
- Creativity
- Problem solving
- Social and emotional growth
- Speech and Language skills
1. Imagination. Children can follow their own plan, or they can share a friend’s vision and work together to create something they never dreamed of.
2. Mathematics. Important concepts and skills are practiced and strengthened through block play, including length, measurement, comparison, number, estimation, symmetry, balance.
3. Self-expression. Blocks offer many ways for young dual language learners to explore, express themselves, and demonstrate what they are learning across languages.
4. Self-esteem. Children discover that they have ideas and that they can bring their ideas to life by creating, transforming, demolishing, and re-creating something unique.
5. Creativity. Blocks are loose parts, meaning children are free to combine and recombine them in countless ways. Practitioners can add alternative resources such as dough, small world characters or paint and pencils to further extend opportunities for creativity.
6. Problem solving. Sometimes it is intentional: “I want to build X. How do I do that?” Other times it is in-the moment: “To go higher and add to one side, what can I use?”
7. Social and emotional growth. Blocks help children learn to take turns and share materials, develop new friendships, become self-reliant, increase attention span, cooperate with others, and develop self-esteem.
8. Speech & Language Development. You might not naturally associate block play with speech and language development, but block play actually promotes a lot of oral self-expression, particularly in telling stories about what they’ve built.
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