It’s that time of year again! Santa’s elves are busy gathering toys for all of the children! One of the most frequently asked questions that we get at TCP at this time of year is whether we have any toy suggestions that are fun while also helping to target speech, language, and motor development. We decided to compile a list of all of our favourite toys to help Santa’s elves decide what to give out for Christmas this year! Read on and find out what your therapist’s favourite toys are! Click the links to be redirected to Santa’s workshop (Amazon!).

Amy’s favourite toy:

The Djeco Topanifarm Stacking Blocks is one of my all-time favourite toys! I can use it to build early animal sounds, stack the blocks to make a tall or short tower, and do pretend play with the animals and houses. We can work on concepts (in, on, next to, behind) and following instructions (e.g., Put the dog in the red house. Put the pink house on the blue house.). We can work on 1-2 word utterances as we build the houses up (e.g., up, on top, put on). We can work on imitation skills, such as knocking on the house, then taking the animal out, or making the animal walk into the house to go to sleep (“night night!”). We can work on hiding and finding the animals, and answering ‘where’ questions (e.g., “Where is the dog? In the blue house? No… Where is the dog? In the pink house? …Yes!”). We can also knock the tower down and use early words and exclamations as we are doing this (e.g., “1…2…3… go!” “Uh oh!”), then build the tower back up again.

 

Fatima’s favourite toy: 

As an occupational therapist, working on fine motor skills is always a priority for parents especially when the child is having some difficulties with handwriting and pencil grasp. One game that I truly enjoy and recommend is Froggy Feeding Fun. This game works on strengthening the intrinsic muscles of the hand required for adequate pencil grasp. It also encourages thumb and index opposition which will help develop pincer grasp. It’s a great turn taking table-top activity which can be played in pairs. Games with similar benefits include The Sneaky, Snacky Squirrel Game, Friday’s Fruit Fiesta Game, and Sophie’s Seashell Scramble Pattern Game.

Krysta’s favourite toy:

Who doesn’t love music?! Melissa and Doug Band-In-A-Box is a great toy music set for the little ones! There are many areas within speech, language and social communication that can be developed through music play. Singing songs together can help with attention, social routines, eye contact, rhyme, sequencing, listening and sounds. Work on motor imitation through copying the different actions with the instruments – shake the tambourine, tap the drum! Or add on a dance move for whole body imitation and some following instructions – clap your hands, turn around, then shake the maracas! Learn early vocabulary and appropriate functional sounds – shake, tap, ding! Shake/tap syllables out to add a fun element to phonological awareness and counting. Build on concepts through music and sound by talking about ‘loud’, ‘quiet’, ‘fast’ or ‘slow’ sounds. Work on early speech sounds through imitating the sounds of the instruments – the drum goes ‘duh duh duh’, the clackers go ‘k k k’! Turn it into band practice with the family and rock around the Christmas tree! 

Megan’s favourite toy: 

One of the most important skills for a child to learn is using both of their hands together well. This is a necessary precursor to academic tasks such as colouring, handwriting, or cutting with scissors. There are lots of fun activities for developing this skills for children of various ages. Some examples include combining and detaching interlocking toys such as snap cubes or Megabloks (which also will improve hand strength!), using wind-up toys, and lacing beads onto a string. Some of my other favourite activities include having a toss with velcro ball mitts, using toys with zippers and snaps, or mixing it up by tossing and catching one of the most popular toys–a “hot potato.” Many of these activities also target other areas, such as visual-motor integration, fine motor skills, and problem solving. Your child will be developing important skills and having fun at the same time!

Miriam’s favourite toy: 

The Bunny Jump game (also called Jumping Jack) is one of my favourites! It allows so many different opportunities for speech, language, and motor skills. Having little ones put the carrots “in” to the bunny’s hill requires some fine motor skills and strength, and when the bunny jumps, the kids are so excited to try and catch it, again working on their coordination. It’s a great turn taking game, and makes working on “my turn” and “your turn” easy and fun! I love to use this game to target s-blends as they “spin” the “spinner” on each turn, or /k/ initial sounds, as they request for “carrots”. WH-questions can also be targeted, when we think about “whose turn?” or “how many carrots?” or “what colour basket would you like?” From my experience, the bunny game is always a big hit!

 

Trisha’s favourite toy:

Play-Doh Kitchen Creations Noodle Makin Mania is as awesome as its name sounds! It is the type of toy that can be used for a variety of speech and language goals and I particularly love using it to facilitate early language learning through pretend play. Kids love watching the play-doh as it squishes out of the noodle maker in long colourful ribbons. It’s a particular hit with children who enjoy tactile sensory activities. It’s also a great way to teach basic vocabulary such as “in” “push” “cut” and “eat.” Once we’ve made noodles, I like to extend the play sequence using pretend pots and pans and “cook” the noodles. We can then pretend to add a bit of sauce and salt, (“shake shake shake”) and “mix” it all up! Careful, it’s “hot!” Kids love to use a pretend knife to “cut” the noodles before we dig in and eat our creations!