Children's Day: Powerful influence of toys your kids play has on them

On children’s day, parents will make a beeline to toy stores to buy toys for their children. Early Childhood Association (ECA) and Podar Institute of Education (PIE) conducted a survey to find out if in the day and age of sexism and women empowerment are we selecting the right toys for our children both boys and girls in their growing years.
 
Do toys contribute to the growth of sexism and empowerment in our children? What roles do toys play and what should parents and teachers do about the same. All these were a part of a survey, an eye-opener for parents and teachers and an essential read for children’s day.

 
Play and toys help stimulate and nurture 90% of a child’s brain development. Froebel the father of kindergarten believed in toys and called them gifts. Montessori system is based completely on toys called didactic material. And yet kids are not playing with toys today or are playing with inappropriate toys shows the survey.
 
Swati Popat Vats, President of Early Childhood Association, said, “Nowadays in kindergartens the focus is on colourful, battery operated toys to woo parents to take admissions. This trend is worrisome and so ECA in association with PIE conducted this survey and interviewed parents and kids to understand what are the present trends so that advocacy and education of parents can be initiated in an effort to bring back the importance of toys in the growing years of young kids.”
 
The survey is conducted only in Mumbai and Chennai cities and a total of 2700 parents were involved in each city. The percentages outside the bracket survey are of Mumbai and those in the bracket are of Chennai.

 
A live sample survey was done with 1000 kids to understand when given choices of toys and left on their own did they select the same toys that they have at home etc. It was found that 60% (65%) of kids did not select the same toys and in fact were more attracted to toys that they did not have like gardening toys, musical instruments, pretend play, puppets etc. when given kitchen set and doctor set, 62% (60%) of girls took on the role of nurses and not doctors. And 88% (89%) chose to play with kitchen set.
 
According to Vats Even in schools, teachers had a tendency to dress girls as nurses and boys as doctors in annual programs if there was a song about doctors. Even in songs depicting sports girls were not dressed for cricket or football or dressed as soldiers instead they were dressed as teachers. So an unconscious message about career choices is being ingrained in young minds right from early childhood.

 
Vats further added, “The brain is a highly integrated organ and its multiple functions operate in a richly coordinated fashion. Oral language acquisition depends not only on adequate hearing, the ability to differentiate sounds, and the capacity to link meaning to specific words, but also on the ability to concentrate, pay attention, and engage in meaningful social interaction. Brain architecture and the immune system also interact as they mature, which influences the domains of development and health. This means that toys are not much for fun but are the foundation for nurturing and stimulating all-round development in kids that will help them even as adults.”
 
It was found that 65% (68%) of the toys selected were incorrect like battery operated or video or screen based toys before the age of 2 years. Very few parents, only 36% (23%) bought toys like blocks, dramatic play/pretend play toys for their kids, 84% of kids are playing with toys that teach them gender bias, violence etc. Only 13% (22%) of parents bought musical instruments or art and craft for kids to play, reasons given, too much noise and not safe for kids. Whereas the window of learning music is up to age five and music and musical instruments help kids develop language and also help the left and right brain communication.

 
According to survey iPads and mobile phones are almost on the verge of being termed as toys by parents. What is the harm? Screen-based gadgets do not give the concept of 3 dimensions to kids. So when concepts and learning are happening totally with screen-based toys then kids will remain weak in algebra, geometry, diagrams, concepts of shapes etc.
 
65% (67%) of parents buy gender specific toys which mean kitchen sets for girls and construction sets
for boys.
54% (65%) parents prefer pink for girls and blue for boys.
67% (60%) parents were unaware that children learn about women empowerment and sexism through
the toys they are exposed to.
76% (72%) parents were unaware that they are unconsciously selecting sexist toys for their children.
88% ( 78%) agreed that now that they know they will select more carefully.

 
More and more kids are playing with gadgets instead of toys, like baby computers, baby mobile phones, baby iPads shows the survey.

Some average percentages that have come out in the survey-

86% (88%) of parents first toy for a girl was a doll.
63% (80%) of parents first toy for a boy was a car. And we talk about tackling gender bias!
59% (76%) of parents said they would not like their boys to play with kitchen set.
73% (81%) of grandmothers did not like boys playing with kitchen set.
57% (65%) of girls opted to be nurses while playing with doctor set.
61% (74%) of parents said that their first choice toy for girls would be kitchen set and not doctor set.
67% (68%) of housewives depended on friends, neighbours and advertisements for choosing toys.
83% (72%) of working moms preferred online help for selection of toys.
54% (34%) of boys chose to play with kitchen set when offered kitchen set and doctor set because they have seen their dads cooking in the kitchen.
51% (34%) of parents do not buy blocks for their children as they find that the other toys are more worth the money and ‘look nice’.
96% of all early childhood experts recommend blocks as the prime toys for development of fine motor skills, colour and shape recognition, creative skills enhancement, language, social and cognitive development.
67% (68%) of the kids preferred toys that did not match those that were preferred by their parents, so if parents preferred cars or puzzles the child preferred pretend play and puzzles.
70% (72%) of kids had dolls, action figures and battery operated toys,
Only 30% (32%) of kids had pretend play toys and played with them.
In outdoor play toys, the common ones 80% (82%) had balls, bats and cycles.
63% (56%) of kids did not use the balls, bats outside but played with them at home due to lack of play space or due to too much sun.
Most of the toys owned by 70% (72%) of the kids were gifted to them, and so were not selected by either the parent or the child.
65% (72%) of kids are playing with hand me down toys.
65% (35%) of parents rated Indian made toys to be better than foreign toys
60% (55%) of parents were aware of the benefits of blocks but yet did not prefer the child to play with blocks at home; according to them, blocks are a school toy.
 
Vats, said, “The above survey results are an eye opener that even today educated parents are unaware of the impact and importance of toys on the development of important socio-emotional skills in children. Parents were shocked when we educated them about how a child who is only exposed to kitchen sets will grow up with the unconscious conditioning that this role is only for women (same with boys) Girls will not be able to think beyond being homemakers and boys will grow up to with sexist attitudes that will impact their relationship with their wives and the impact they will have on the education of upbringing of their children.”
 

For a list of toys that have been recalled by manufacturers, visit the Toy Hazard Recalls page of the Consumer Product Safety Commission Website:
http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/category/toy.html
 
For information on lead poisoning, you can obtain a free brochure from the American Academy of
Pediatrics: http://www.aap.org/new/Lead-PatientEdBrochure.pdf