Sunday, October 11, 2015

The Best Wooden Puzzles for Toddlers and Kids

Wooden puzzles can be important to childhood development. You might be surprised to learn that jigsaw puzzles and other challenging problem-solving games help along learning skills, enhancing fine motor abilities and encouraging tykes to use their ingenuities, imaginations, and brilliant thinking skills.

I have hand-picked three from my list of the ten best wooden puzzles with these amazing learning benefits in mind. These puzzles are fun, vibrant, and engaging, snagging and holding attention and imagination while instilling and honing valuable early learning skills.

These puzzles are great for toddlers and kids, and there IS a difference for those shaking their heads in confusion. We recognize kids as those little people who have developed most of their childhood skills around age 5, while toddlers are the toddling little humans who are just learning how to walk, talk, and interact with their surroundings.

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Melissa and Doug Peek-Through Animal Puzzle

I love this puzzle because it combines traditional puzzle play with textures and animals. The animals, such as owls, turtles, giraffes, and lions, are the puzzle pieces, fitted into little squares and plopped into a bigger square.

When kids put the puzzle pieces in place, the textures beneath shine through, giving the turtle a scaly hide, the bee smoother stripes, the owl fluttering feathers, and so on.

Kids can mix and match the animals around the board with the different patterns to create new, interesting textures.

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Melissa and Doug See-Inside Alphabet Peg Puzzle

I am a BIG advocate for early reading and literacy. I believe it is one of those most important things you can teach children from a young age, so no surprise that this puzzle is one of my favorites.

Each letter from A through Z is a puzzle piece with a peg knob for easy lifting and placement. Underneath each letter, there are animal surprises, such as alligators, zebras, and bears.

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Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Wooden Chunky Puzzle

The Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is a staple television show that followed me throughout my childhood. However, it has since been revamped, and instead of people, there are beloved cartoon characters living in a cartoon world.

This puzzle brings those characters to life. There are 8 puzzle pieces on a backdrop of Disney brilliance, inclusive of the actual Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. Pluto, Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, Pete, Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Goofy, and Chip & Dale are all present and accounted for.

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