12 Amazing Benefits of Playing with Building Blocks

Building blocks are one of the best toys you can get for your child. There is so much a child can learn from building blocks. Fine motor skills, identification of shapes and colours, building imagination, pretend play and whatnot.

Building blocks can be the best thing you have ever got for your child. It might be a traditional toy to play with, but every house with a child and every kindergarten classroom should have building blocks. Building blocks now come in different materials, sizes and shapes, which are even more fun for the child to play with. Following are some amazing benefits of playing with building blocks.

1. Fine Motor Skill Development

Fine motor skills are using the small muscles like the muscles of fingers, to do things, e.g. hold, scribble, eat, stack, cut with scissors, etc. when the child starts playing with the blocks, the child tries to hold the blocks with his or her fingers, and stack them.

Slowly the child will learn how to hold it properly as the fine motor skills will start developing with age as well as practice. So, building blocks are excellent in the development of these skills. Children with good fine motor skills usually have good handwriting later in school.

Related: Brain Boosting Toys For Kids

2. Developing Hand Eye Co-ordination

When the child tries to stack a block over the other, the child needs to coordinate between his or her hands and eyes. The child will first see the block, hold it, and then stack it over the other block. It might take some time to stack even a few blocks, but the more the child does it, the more the child’s hand and eye coordination will improve.

Related: 14 Terrific Benefits of Jigsaw Puzzles for Kids

3. Increasing Concentration

When they focus on something the concentration increases. If you think it is difficult for your child to sit in a place for more than 2 minutes, get the child a full set of building blocks. When they stack, the blocks will fall as they are not fully aware of the spatial concept yet. So, they will do it again and again, and the concentration will increase.

4. Spatial Awareness

Spatial awareness is when the child starts learning about the space around them, or how to manage the space they have. When they are playing with blocks and building something out of their imagination, they will slowly start understanding the space they will require to build it, the width as well as the height, and the way they have to stack the blocks, so that they do not fall.

It is very helpful in learning the concept of space and surroundings. You might need to help them in the beginning.

5. Shape Recognition

There are so many different types of building blocks available in different shapes. These can be used to teach the child various shapes square, triangle, rectangle etc. The child will grasp easily and more quickly.

6. Colour Recognition

Colour recognition is another benefit of building blocks. Yes, there are sets which do not come in colours, but you can always opt for the coloured ones if you are keen on teaching your child colours. Personally, my daughter started naming colours at the age of 17 months, which is a little early just because we introduced various building blocks to her, also we asked her a lot of questions like, “What colour are you wearing today?” or “Can you see a pink flower?”. Yellow was the first colour she named.

7. Developing Problem-Solving Skills

When you play with blocks, you tend to create something. When you make something you put on new ideas and try solving problems. This will help them in using their brain better in new things. Some blocks come with pieces that fit in. These help in developing the problem-solving things better.

8. Developing Imagination

Sometimes kids even start playing pretend play with blocks. They make their own imaginary scenario and pretend play. It can be anything depending on the child’s fantasies and what the child has been seeing or listening to. They imagine and build things like towers, trucks, buildings, castles etc.

This is a very good idea when you want your child to engage in pretend play which is a very important developmental milestone for children.

9. Learning Team Play

Many times when children are playing with building blocks they have the company of friends or they would like you to play with them. So, they slowly start playing like a team, start sharing their toys and adjusting to how the other person wants to play. So, it is a very good initiative to start a team play.

Next time you are organising a playdate for your child, make sure building blocks are a part of the toys you give them to play. But still, the best playdates will always be those that are organised outdoors.

10. Language Development

The child starts learning new words while playing with building blocks, like different colour names, shape names, names of buildings, and many other words. So new vocabulary is added every time they play. You can introduce the concept of small and big, tall and small, long and short and many more things.

You get blocks which have alphabets and numbers, so you can introduce that as well to your child through blocks. these are good for early learning and identification.

11. Developing Science Concepts

Many concepts like gravity, force, stability, balance etc, can all be learned when using building blocks. All these basic concepts help them learn better later in life and understand the concepts better at school.

12. Developing Concepts in Maths or Numeracy

When they stack, they can start counting. You can help them count in the beginning and slowly they will start learning and understanding the concept. They can start comparing the sizes, the height of the towers they build, the width, the larger and the smaller groups etc. Slowly the concepts are built.

Building blocks can help your child in tremendous ways and can help them gain knowledge, and life skills as well as enjoy alone or with their peers. So, the birthday gift you can get a one-year-old is a complete set of building blocks.