Veggie Tales Jigsaw Puzzle
Either you love them or leave them. Some people can spend all their spare time working any number of simple jigsaw puzzles to complex 3D jigsaw puzzles. Which category do you fall in?
Children, on the other hand, most always enjoy putting the colorful pieces together. And, if your children have an interest in a certain category such as flowers, trucks, dolls, cowboys, pirates, and safari animals you will find it easy to search online and find kids jigsaw puzzles that will keep your kids busy for hours of quiet fun.
There was a “golden age” of jigsaw puzzles. This was around 1920 – 1930’s when the great depression was in progress. Putting together jigsaw puzzles, they say, helped to relieve stress. Puzzles during this era were inexpensive and with the ability to be reused over and over helped make them popular in the depression era.
Educational Children’s Toys: Privileged children, back in 1066, would be found playing with pictures of British kings and queens made into jigsaw puzzles. This was one way they were taught history. This would be a great idea to bring back; find pictures of our presidents and other famous people and paste them onto cardboard. Draw lines with a black marker and cut out the pieces. Presto, you have made a new puzzle for your kids and an educational toy as well.
Learning geography can be made fun and interesting (and easier to learn) if you purchase a large map of the world, or the USA, for example. Cut it up into a puzzle. Homeschoolers will love this project, you can teach your kids where grandma lives, or an uncle or aunt. When they see something in the news about an event they can go get their puzzle map and find the location.
When a child is not feeling well, or perhaps the weather is too hot, too cold, or too wet outside an great indoor activity would be to bring out the jigsaw puzzles. Older kids can help the toddlers while you fix lunch. Working puzzles, whether jigsaw or 3d is always a calm, quite, relaxing activity.
Often, in break rooms, day care centers (for children and adults) there are several tables set up with an array of jigsaw puzzles being worked on. Even in Alzheimer’s centers, senior citizen centers and play rooms in homes children and adults alike are likely to be spending time either alone or in a group trying to piece together a pretty picture.
Group activities putting together puzzles provide needed socialization for adults and children alike. For children puzzle play is a great way for them to develop basic hand-eye coordination skills. For young toddlers you will want to provide many puzzles with large colorful pieces so they can easily grip the pieces and gain self confidence as they successfully assemble each puzzle.
Need an idea for a birthday party? How about utilizing children’s jigsaw puzzles? After you have selected your theme you might consider having a group game of completing a large jigsaw puzzle as your main party activity. You could begin by having the children make the jigsaw puzzle as suggested above. There will be plenty of great photo opportunities during this party!
There are jigsaw and 3d wooden puzzles available online to spark the interest of all ages of children and adults. There is a very unique set of Safari blocks that could be considered a 3d wood puzzle – take a look at this Stacking Safari 3d wooden Puzzle.
Another popular theme you might like to consider (and don’t see in stores all the time) is the Veggie Tales children’s jigsaw puzzles. Such puzzles include these 100 piece puzzles for kids age 5 and up:
Veggie Tales Two Sided Pirates Jigsaw Puzzle
Veggie Tales Campfire Sing Along
Veggie Tales Caribbean Bob
Veggie Tales Sweetpea Beauty (pictured above)
Veggie Tales Larry Boy and Fib From Outer Space.
The below link might also help give you other good activity ideas.
Play Jigsaw Safari – Piece Together 50 Puzzles!
Go on a safari of jigsaw fun with amazing pictures of exotic animals & amazing African scenery. A delightful challenge for puzzle lovers, each of the 50 vibrant images features elephants, lions, bison, penguins, and more in their natural habitats.
Need even more puzzles to play. You can do these online: http://origin.www.shockwave.com/gamelanding/bonusjigsaws.jsp
This concludes week number two of Friday Features. We hope you enjoyed reading about jigsaw puzzles and found some new and interesting party ideas. Read our Press Release if you are not sure what Friday Features are all about.
Creative play is important in a child’s education. Providing educational children’s toys such as playsets allow creative play for a child playing alone or in a group.
Playsets are also a great teaching tool for lessons. With the chunky pieces of individual sea animals in the Sealife playset pictured here you can make up games to teach children about the wonderment of under water life.
Here is another game you could use. Find pictures of sea life creatures, or have the children find them. Laminate and cut them in half. Have your children match up the fronts with the backs of the creatures. If you can’t find any pictures you could trace the individual figures from the puzzle playset onto brightly colored construction paper.
Another variation of this game is for the teacher to mismatch the animals’ halves and see if the children can spot the correct halves.
Home schools and preschools will get years of use out of wood puzzles, puzzle playsets and indoor wooden play sets when purchasing quality educational children’s toys. Shop for toys that are made from splinter-proof wood and painted with non-toxic paints. And remember to wipe down and sanitize all your toys each day.
Natural wood puzzles make great gifts any time of the year and especially at Christmas. When you want unique educational children’s toys consider natural 3d wood puzzles. These puzzles double as a craft because when your child is old enough he can paint his puzzle with water colors.
If your child likes puppy dogs he will love all eleven puppies that help make up this 3d wood puzzle. He will have a great time stacking the puppies on top of one another while he learns to count. The puzzle stands up by itself and makes a pretty display on a table or bookshelf.
Keeping your child’s wood puzzles, especially the one with many small pieces such as this toy, on a shelf will help keep all the pieces in one safe place.
Creating fun family nights is a good way to get to better know your children. Playing Bible board games is one of the best ideas I know of to accomplish this.
When selecting a new game, educational children’s toys and a variety of wooden board games keep in mind not only your child’s interest but the age groups for which you are purchasing.
The “old standard” games are a good place to start your game shopping but for those of you who would like to find something a little out of the ordinary your online shopping will reveal many unique board games you have not seen in stores.
Consider “Eco Ranch”. Manufactured by ImagiPLAY, this is a new board game for a greener future. Made in the USA this strategy game if a family-friendly educational game which encourages players to create a more sustainable environment and to protect and nurture our planet.
This wooden board game is geared for ages 12 and up and is available online.
At the far end of the world, there exists a strange and unusual chain of islands, resting above vast tectonic plates. This is the world of the Galápagos Archipelago, home to salt-spitting marine iguanas, flightless cormorants, and giant tortoises that can live to be more than 150 years of age.
It is also the birthplace of Darwinism, for here in 1835, a young Charles Darwin began to formulate a theory which would turn the world upside down. More than a century and a half later, these mysterious islands remain at the center of a controversy that has shaped the way modern men perceive science, religion, and life itself. The unique ingredients found on the Galápagos have led many of Darwin’s followers to describe it as Darwin’s Eden — a “laboratory of evolution.”
For educators and parents the subject of Darwin’s theory will eventually come up and children will be fascinated with marine and sea life creatures. At this point it will be necessary to have several educational children’s toys on hand to help with your lessons.
Wooden puzzles and play sets will be a good starting point. The Sealife puzzle playset has a variety of individual characters you can use to show the differences in each fish, turtle, etc.
When Darwin was a young man he traveled around the world on the H.M.S. Beagle (1831-1836), a research vessel. His job was to make observations on the plants and animals found in the places the ship docked.
While on the trip, Darwin saw many strange and new plants and animals and began to wonder how they could have come to be. He was particularly struck by the animals of the Galapagos Islands, where he found that each island had a different kind of tortoise, a different kind of finch, and a different kind of marine iguana.
You can read more on this interesting website - http://www.terindell.com/asylum/jason/darwin.html and incorporate the information into your lessons. As you use your educational children’s toys your lessons come alive and your children will come up with their own ideas and questions to make for a lively discussion.
Physicians, educators and parents are ever aware of the popularity of giant cardboard blocks. Kids of various age groups can play together making large blocks one of the best educational children’s toys on the market.
Kids building blocks, such as ImagiBRICKS, bring many benefits to your children as they play and work together to design, build, knock down and re-build. It is especially important to supply children in day care centers and preschools with as many giant cardboard blocks as you have room for.
Besides increasing your children’s attention span and level of concentration children will develop perceptual, motor, and memory skills.
Playing with toy building blocks help build up self-esteem as there is no wrong way to build. And by creating, exploring and constructing in different ways children are doing hands-on problem solving and becoming divergent thinkers.