It seems clear that more and more boys and girls are inclined towards the so-called "Smart toys", those in which technology prevails, which are accompanied by remote control and in which the "special effects" shine in every way.
Sing in playback, draw on a digital board, ride a bike without leaving home, robot dolls that talk and do almost everything, interactive stories, computers for children ... And, although these toys certainly stimulate the manipulative and technological intelligence of the little ones, I think a lot of imagination is lost along the way.
I do not think that these toys make silly children, as I wonder in the headline, even some are true devices that I would like to play with myself. But I do believe that these expensive, expensive toys, along with many other toys of the same style will limit the fun style of the little ones and disrupt their sense of the important, of the necessary.
The other day I commented with my students questions about the value we give to things, when they discussed how much it had cost them (they speak as if it cost them, but it is the parents, of course, who disburse) a Play Station. How "before" we had no computers, no video games, no Internet and yet we enjoyed other things. From when the "Simon" was no longer in modernity and technology.
They were really surprised when I confessed that, as a child, one of my favorite games when I was alone was “the rags”, some silk fabrics of various colors and sizes with which I mounted a whole stage and a costume: it could be from A princess in a medieval castle a pirate assaulting a ship. When the game was in a group, the chances increased. And only with rags.
The same could apply to the broom sticks that made the sword, the cartons, stones and plants that made the kitchens with the most varied menus, the hiding place, the rope, the English chick or that worn out doll that neither cried nor pissed , at least in reality, but that he did everything in our mind and we worshiped and did not leave until his arms fell out of old ...
By the way, some of these old dolls amuse my baby a lot now. Let's wait to see what happens when I grow up ...
Anyway, I can only say, How times change!
In Babies and more | How to make a toy kitchen, Recommendations for choosing safe toys
