It’s surprising sometimes when kids tell stories about their new discoveries or when they explain how they’d solve a certain problem after they play with their balancing blocks, wooden puzzles, or ball tracker. Sometimes they insist that their observations are more valid than yours!
They drop their favorite toy from their highchair to the floor and see what happens. Kids try making mud pies in the garden, they examine lady bugs that sit on top of a flower, they pick berries and collect pinecones.
Your kids become more curious about things the older they get. They want to know almost everything. When you tell them not to touch power outlets, they would want to touch them even more, just to see why. And when you say you can’t go to the park, be prepared to answer why.
That’s an opportunity for you to teach logic to your child, though sometimes they discover reasons on their own, while they play or watch other people.
You can help your child develop reasoning and understand how the world works so they can reason better through montessori toys, cause and effect toys, logic exercises, and simply letting them speak and strategize on their own.
Exercises to improve your child’s logic skills
Ask open-ended questions
Open-ended questions have no right or wrong answers. Ask your kids these types of questions to broaden their thinking process. They can think of many possibilities they can with just a simple question.
Ask your child to describe his or her morning routine, name animals that fly, describe their feelings when they play, and so on.
Provide opportunities to play
Your kids learn cause and effect when they play. Give them opportunities to play inside and outside your home so they can explore things better.
Spend lots of time pretending
When your little one plays pretend, they understand symbols more. When they recognize what those symbols represent, they can think of creative ideas to make those things more useful.
Like a banana toy, aside from it being a fruit, your little one may have used it as a telephone during his play. Or a shoebox, instead of just storing your shoes in there, they use it as beds for their dolls or little houses for their miniature toys.
Pause and wait
Offer your child ample time to think and reflect when doing a task, or generating a response. Let them find their words. Let them strategize. This helps them think more or refine what to do or to say, rather than just doing or saying what comes in their minds first.
Figure out what objects do and how things work, together
Watch your child and observe what they are interested in. Once you know what your kids like, offer them plenty of chances to experience and see things in creative ways.
Ask your child questions like, “what do you think you’ll find if you dig in the mud?”, what can you create out of the milk carton?” or you let your child wonder how things are, ask them, “how do you think bees make honey?”
Toys to develop your child’s basic logic skills
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Pattern Play
Patterns are everywhere!
Kids find patterns in nature, numbers, symbols, shapes, colors, name it! At an early age, they also begin to understand that when the clouds turn dark and grey, it might rain.
Pattern play has varying shapes that introduces significant math concepts to your kids like sorting and matching, and problem solving. They can use the blocks to form countless designs, symmetry.
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Building Blocks
Blocks come in various sizes and shapes that can be stacked in many ways. Your kids learn to estimate, recognize patterns, understand balance, and increase their understanding of logic. And as the complexity increases, so does your child’s concentration and logic skills.
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Puzzles
Logic puzzles are educational toys that challenge your kid’s minds and develop strategies to win and complete the game.
Find the Difference puzzles makes your child concentrate on the picture to spot the differences in two mostly identical pictures. He can think of strategies, like where to start looking, or take mental notes of the difference he already found.
Single shape puzzles are good for toddlers too. It strengthens their matching skills and hand-eye coordination.
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STEM toys
Pop-up toys, construction set, building tiles, and sorting games, teach your child to explore and investigate. These toys make them curious and feel excited to explore, build, arrange, or just to figure out how they work.
Wooden puzzles and stacking cups or rings are best STEM toys for 1-year olds. The colorful pieces invite them to grab, mouth, fling and stack the rings or the puzzle pieces, that also teach them about shapes, colors, and develops their hand-eye coordination, and they learn more about cause and effect.
Pounding bench with wooden toy, and nuts and bolts building set are good for 2-year olds. It introduces them to logical and spatial reasoning, Math, color recognition, and more.
These fun, educational toys help build and improve your child’s logic and other cognitive skills. They also develop self-confidence and grit when they play, teaching them to try and try again, persevere until they can build something, and feel passionate about what they’re doing, which they need in their daily lives as they grow.