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Play
Homemade toys and free activities for children
Homemade toys and activities help children learn and develop, because they can stimulate curiosity, creativity and imagination. They’re also great for building your relationship with your child, and they’re a lot of fun.
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Child Development
Why is play important?
Play is central to your child’s learning and development. When your child plays, it gives them many ways and times to learn.
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Play
Childhood games and toys
Why are games and toys important in childhood? Toys and games can be an important part of children’s play, and play is central to children’s learning and development.
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Early Learning
A parent's gift guide for sensory play
We want to buy gifts our children will enjoy, but taking a moment to look at our choices through the eyes of an occupational therapist can influence our selection in ways that can also help our child build confidence, resilience and self care skills.
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Early Learning
Boost imagination with ‘loose parts’ play
It’s easy to define toys as objects with a distinct form: a car, a doll or a toy train. However, if we broaden our definition of playthings to include everyday objects or 'loose parts', we can promote imagination and create rich play for children.
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Early Learning
The importance and benefits of free play
In an effort to give children the best possible start in life it is possible to fill every spare moment with activities. This does however put pressure on parents and risks leaving little time for vital play, an important part of brain development.
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Early Learning
Perseverance: Teaching the value of effort
Learning to persevere is an important skill for children to learn and researchers have found parents play a very valuable role in modelling the behaviour. It’s all about trying, failing, and if you are a parent, being seen to fail without giving up.
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Early Learning
Music a key to childhood learning
Give a child a pot, a pan and a wooden spoon – or even their own hands, feet and voice – and music can be made. As well as the intellectual and academic benefits, music is enabling children to identify, understand and, to a degree, process emotions.
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