Toys that kindle kids’ imagination

“Many of the conventional popular plastic toys manufactured abroad fail to address the local context in which a child lives. Many do not engage a child creatively and often offer a very ‘structured’ experience”,said Finland-born Anders Sandell,who is currently heading the Lab.

The toys range from an inverted periscope insect tracker,spring-to-life puppets,an animated book,a re-designed top,to those that allow a child to spin around their imagination and those that aesthetically combine technology with an arresting narrative to deliver a powerful story that engages children holistically,he said.

Explaining the lab’s venture into designing and producing creative toys on an experimental basis,he said several people were tired of the toy industry which often is ‘manipulative’ in marketing toys to children,often holding parents as hostages.

A research conducted by the group before launching the project revealed that the toys failed to address the local familiar environment angle of a child.Many parents worried over quality and safety of locally produced toys,he said.

Working on these research findings the experimental group of 11 students have designed toys that got a child to explore his physical environment,probe the mysteries of nature and understand science and technology in a simplistic way.

A cardboard periscope that works the other way round and fitted on little wheels helps a child run around and have a peek at a running beetle,ant or a little worm squirming in the ground.

“Instead of giving an upward glimpse as in a submarine,it helps a child through mirrors have a view of the ground”,said Nachi,a toy maker,who has also made a wooden version of the inverted periscope toy.

Such a toy works on a child’s natural curiosity of exploring everything around him,he said. Armed with a periscope,he can actually see the flower,the insect or anything that catches his imagination reflected on the mirror and could even capture it on a camera,he said.

The toy has been made of carboard and waste wood simply because they could be dismantled,he said.

Another toy developed by two other students introduces a child to gardening. The toy set comes with a set of ‘strawberry men’ made out of cloth apart from colourfully designed tiny seed bags.It also contains list of colourful illustrations and step-by-step instructions.

“The instructions written in a simple way guide the child how to plant a seed and watch it grow”. The seeds are those that could be easily grown and can be taken care of like mint,pepper and strawberry. A website enables children owning the toys to connect and share their experience,Anders said.

A toy that offers a child a multisensory experience is an animated book called Khoya designed by Shilo Shiv Suleman.

The book full of illustrations allows a child to read the book by going through a text. But it also offers a more

engaging experience when a child by pushing a little folder up a webcam can actually see the entire illustration in an animated form.

The book also includes the green earth element in its story line as it tells the story of a child waking up to reality that has truly gone wrong and story of a lost environment.

Another toy is a top which does not rivet on an iron nail but through a clever architecture spins on a wooden one. The two-in-top (with another top concealed inside one) is aimed at tapping the surprise element of a child,Anders said.

Toys which helps a child express his physicality,apart from ploughing into his own minefield of imagination,and deliver unstructured learning could go a long way in serving the very objective of what toys are all meant to be—an ultimate engaging experience,he added.