Forget dolls and toy cars — giving children unusual objects such as whisks and potato mashers to play with could boost their development, research suggests. A US study analysed how 32 children aged between two and four interacted with familiar and unfamiliar objects at home.
Parents were asked to play with their children with familiar toys for 10 minutes, before offering them a novel household item. Youngsters touched unusual objects such as a tea strainer, a funnel and a brick, more than common toys.
They spent an average of 5.32 seconds touching the novel item each time they picked it up, compared to 4.64 seconds for the familiar toy.
Delaney Witmer, a student researcher at Arizona State University, said an unfamiliar object “snags their attention”.
She added: “It’s engaging and it helps with attentional shifts, switching their attention from something they have seen every day versus something new.”
On average, unusual objects were touched 40 times during the 10 minute play session compared to 30 times for familiar toys.
Ms Witmer added: “You’ll also see, with unfamiliar objects, that the kids will more often look toward their parent for clues of how to play with it.”
The researcher said she would “absolutely” encourage parents to introduce children to new objects in a safe way.
“Even if they’ve just played with it for three minutes, at least they’re learning more and playing with a new object,” she added.
“Toy interaction plays an important role for young children’s learning and memory.”
The findings were presented at the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s annual meeting in Phoenix, Arizona.
This story originally appeared on Express.co.uk
