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Finding toys that my nine and five-year-olds will both play with together is becoming quite a challenge. More often than not, the eldest will really want to do something that the youngest will then flatly refuse to do. And you can guess how it ends up. So, I was looking forward to seeing what they’d make of the imminent arrival of our CONNETIX tiles. We were gifted two sets of tiles so that we could try them out and share how the girls played with them.
The girls tend to be much better at playing together when there aren’t many “rules”, patterns, or a certain way of doing things, so open-ended play definitely works best for them. CONNETIX tiles seemed to fit the bill well for this!
The sets can be used to create specific structures, but also encourage children to use their imaginations and make whatever shape or design comes into their heads. The genius part is that they have magnets all the way around the sides. This allows the tiles to easily fit together in pretty much whichever way you fancy.
CONNETIX not only make great toys for all children, but are actually a great facilitator in building attachment and connection between parent and child. As an adoptive parent, I can see they’d be especially good to use during adoption introductions/transitions and during the early stages of placement. Because they encourage free play, there’s no wrong way to use them which can help to build confidence.
You could sit on the floor and start creating on your own with the tiles, gently encouraging your little one to join in. If they’re not ready to, they can still play with you close by, watching what you’re creating and perhaps copying. As they’re playing you can watch and encourage, letting them know you are close by if they want to join in with you. It’s a great way to start building attachments at their pace. Adopted children often struggle to trust new adults because of their early life experiences.
Games are a simple and effective way to help them learn how to transfer their attachment from their foster carer to you. Turn-taking, copying each other, some physical touch, following the leader, and building skills are all elements of paying with CONNETIX tiles with your child that will help to encourage and build attachment.
The girls opened the boxes when they came home from school – even the packaging went down well so I was very optimistic at how much they’d enjoy playing with the contents. We were sent the CONNETIX 30 Piece Rainbow Geometry Pack and the CONNETIX 50 Piece Transport Pack from the Rainbow range to try. The girls loved the colours straight away and were intrigued as to what they were supposed to do with the tiles. I didn’t give them much guidance and said they should see if they could build something with them.
My five-year-old tackled the Geometry Pack and wanted to see what shapes she could make on her own. Our eldest got to work on the Transport Pack, following the picture to construct the truck and trailers. They loved playing independently, but beside one another, offering the odd word of encouragement to each other. I had a completely blissful 20 minutes with a hot cup of tea!
The beauty of these types of toys is that they’re open-ended. The sets come with an Ideas Booklet with lots of ideas about shapes and designs that could be built with the sets. But to start off with, particularly my youngest loved just working out how to put them together and make pretty shapes and patterns. She loved letting her imagination run free and seeing what happened when she put different shapes and colours together.
My nine-year-old preferred to stick to the suggested design which she built on her own. She loved working out how the tiles fitted together to balance on top of each other and create the height for the trailers. There were some tricky bits at this point as some of the tiles wouldn’t balance on top of each other. With a few words of encouragement, she quickly worked out which way the magnets needed to go and was away again.
The next time she played with them, she tried a different design from the booklet. Again, she was very happy working things out for herself by following the pictures. That’s the great thing about the tiles. They can be used in so many ways. So far, my eldest has mainly preferred to create structures following the designs, whereas my youngest has preferred to do her own thing.
It’s been lovely to watch them play with the tiles and to have found something they can both get so much enjoyment from, by using them in different ways. As parents, we all know that playing is how our children learn – Syeda Sazia Zaman, an education and child development expert at BRAC University, explained to UNICEF exactly why – “Play is at the core of the development of the child….It is a really important tool for children’s cognitive, physical, social, and emotional development and also their imagination and creativity.”
Open-ended toys like CONNETIX allow children to build and create using their imagination, helping them to develop so many skills. From gross motor skills to independence, creativity, collaboration and so much more. This kind of play basically lets children explore different ideas and theories that they develop themselves, without the worry of someone saying to them that they’re doing it wrong. They can build whatever shape or structure they want with the tiles, learning things like how to balance items on top of each other, patience, and problem-solving as they go.
I think that’s so important, particularly for anxious children or those who’ve experienced early life trauma and are worried in general about doing the wrong thing. Open-ended play lets them have fun in a safe and nurturing environment that is child-led and encourages learning.
My girls absolutely loved playing with the tiles. They’ve played with them on their own, and together. And each time they’ve worked with each other so that they shared the pieces and created some great shapes and structures.
Open-ended play is particularly good for children who struggle with frustration and self-regulation. There are no rules therefore there is no right or wrong way to play, which helps a child to feel in control and better able to regular themselves. Our youngest experiences lots of anger at the moment, which often results in her screaming and getting very upset and frustrated. Usually this happens during play, and she’ll either storm off or disrupt the game.
She’s played with the CONNETIX tiles several times since they arrived, and each time she’s been quite calm and regulated, even when she can’t find the right piece, or it takes her some time to work out how to create what she wants to. That’s quite a big thing for her. She’s played quite happily for long periods of time on her own, and with her sister, sharing the pieces.
So, in terms of finding toys that both kids can play with, both together and on their own, in their own way, CONNETIX definitely gets a thumbs up from us. They’re strong, durable tiles that I can see lasting many years. How the kids use them will change as they grow, so I definitely think they’ll have a place in our toy cupboard for a long time to come.
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