Browsing the toy shops these days often leave you with bulks of plastic and electronic gadgetry with little food for thought. The new age toys make noise, produce light and do funny antics. And we often wonder what has happened to our good old toys that we loved so much in our childhood. The basic difference between the old fashioned traditional toys and the new age ones is that the former works to build the imagination and allows the creativity to come to fore. Modern electronic toys leave no option for the kids but to watch them play just like TV.

To get that little mind ticking, you need to have a good dose of old fashioned toys. Here are some traditional toys that you can get for your kid to give him or her the much required development stimuli.

Wooden blocks

Nothing can beat the extent of creativity and fun the wooden blocks provide to these young minds. Children of all ages can play for hours building houses, cars, bridges, towers and what not. Building blocks push children to think out of the box and to build a different structure each time. Such toys break the shackles and put the imaginative minds of children at work.

Puppets

Learning toys like Puppets allow lot of scope for improvisation and children can learn the art of creative story telling. They can get involved in pretend play and play sets can be anyone from pirates, princes or princesses to doctors and firemen. This kind of play provokes them to use their mind to weave a story and then enact it. Having a predetermined script limits the level of freedom they can enjoy.

Art and Craft

Ready made craft sets limit the imagination of the child to a specific object. Give them paper and crayons and let them indulge in free play. It teaches children the art of self expression. Play dough, scrap books encourage children to use their imagination and give them the license to create.

Music

Music plays a very important role in the overall development of the child. According to certain studies, the preschoolers who learn playing any musical instrument develop great mathematical skills later in life. Again, music acts as a fuel for imagination and creativity. Apart from self expression, it is a great stress buster too that can come quite handy in later years.

These are just few of the traditional old fashioned toys that are known to make children creative and smart. Toy kitchens, doll houses, teddy bears, dolls are some other options. All traditional toys reinforce just one fact that if you want to create a hunger to explore and to learn in children, you need to let them use their own mind and not any electronic gadgetry that limits the cognitive and emotional development.