Ability of three-dimensional thinking and spatial awareness is very valuable. It is important to start learning such skills from an early age, when looking at the world and looking at the different problems just started. To help your child expand the ability to see things three-dimensional and to plan their work, I think it would be enough to have a few blocks, cardboard cartons, plastic bottles or buttons. I encourage you to read and see how it looks in practice.
At the beginning, I encourage you to play with children blocks such as Lego. Fun with such bricks give much joy to children and adults. There are bigger blocks adapted to size and development of small hand motorics, and smaller for those who are already able to grasp movements of their hands and fingers.
I would like to present our constructions with Lego Duplo blocks. At first, when Ewa got her first kit when she was two year old, she had to learn how to connect one block with the other. We were learning colours on them by creating a rainbow. We learned which piece is smaller, bigger, shorter and longer. After a while our collection has grown into kits with animals and people and we have already started to build more interesting things. At first we had to answer the question: how to build a house in such way, that it does not split when we want to move it? Or, how big should be a house to fit one guy, second one, and what if a giraffe will come to it? Our next set was a set with trains. It brought new serious buildings such as a railway station or a coal-loading crane. And in general it taught how to build tracks and to connect them to form a loop. For all these problems, Ewa had to find answer either by thinking or by trial and error. Once we felt comfortable with bricks, we have started creating driveways from the track to the table in the room or to build loops from the tracks as a carousel.
One of our last ideas was to film a time-lapse movie, by building scenes from blocks and moving people and animals. Great fun.
Today we are trying to play with smaller blocks and we learn how to combine small, thin blocks, so that the structure does not split. The difficulty level is much higher.
Some time ago, there was an exhibition of Lego blocks in Gdańsk. We highly recommend going to such events. You could see what great and complicated constructions can be created. At the end we went to Lego "sandbox" where there were a lots of Lego bricks for free play.
In addition to blocks, we also decided to build a cardboard castle for princess. We picked up cartons that remained after our house equipment or shoes. With this type of play you can learn how to use scissors and how to use sticky tape in such way that various elements will not spread out. And at the end you can paint whole castle how you like.
If we are already describing what you can do with cardboard things, we should mention what a great garage you can build with rolls of toilet paper. Just add some glue, a few paper rolls and spent a moment of time, and every little toy car in your house can find its place in the garage.
Another interesting, simple construction equipment are plastic bottles, caps and buttons of different sizes and shapes. From the bottles we made human-like creatures with elaborate hairstyles. From the buttons we built flowers and cottages, and with caps we learned numbers, by filling out already drawn number on the number sheets.
At the end I wanted to show you what a cool pirate ship you can build at home on a small table couch, with a piece of cloth and small trinkets.
Our pirate Ewa was playing with her ship all week. You could have lots of fun by recreating pirate and sailboat scenes. I think that such fun is a great way to develop imagination.
Today, you can find a lot of different interesting blocks, such as Lego, Incastro and simple wooden sets. They are fun to play with, and each child develops skills such as constructing things. Those activities allow them to practice small hand movements and grips. So I encourage you to play with kids bricks. I also encourage you to play with simple things you can find at home: buttons, caps, plastic bottles or cardboard leftovers from hardware or toilet paper.