The world is not the same place, which it was a century ago. Technology has revolutionized change, and thus the need to accept technology is now more than ever. In a bid to introduce coding to youngsters to coding which is the ultimate thing behind technological change, there are numerous toy products out there to support it.
It was time, that coding was incorporated into their daily lives, but at the same time, making it fun, else it would be boring. It is true that experimenting with coding increases creativity and the human brain goes beyond its limits to explore what it hasn’t before. The cognitive skills like critical thinking and problem-solving seem to be developed much better for such youngsters.
Coding isn’t just a part of the curriculum but now toy manufacturers are also including coding as an essential part of how their toys operate. This ultimately makes that boring looking coding homework turn out to be fun.
These coding toys rather work in a peculiar way. When you play around with the commands, mixing up some “sugar and spice” it leads to different outputs which in children’s case is sounds, lights, and movement. Perhaps, if your child is a natural coder, then letting him play around with these things would only enhance their skillset. Here is a couple of them you can try:
There is a Think & Learn Code-a-Pillar meant for preschoolers that is between ages 3 to 6. The most basic of command could be learnt by the children. They will just need to join them in a pattern. The coding blocks are to be joined to each other through USB ports. By employing 15 different commands for each one, just think of the number of different possibilities your child can explore.
There is also a toy for 8-year-olds by the name of Ozobot Evo. This can easily fit into your pocket too and doesn’t even need a display either. The commands are written down on paper with color markers and it reads them. You can print mazes, puzzles, and races, which the Evo has to follow. In case your child is too smart for these simple ones, there is also a Blockly Application, which is meant for advanced programming tasks.
There is also another one for 8-year-olds which might resemble Wall-E a lot and is named Cozmo. It was initially meant to be an interactive robot with its very own personality. Though, it had even more potential so they even added a coding component known as the Scratch Blocks. Though mind you, it will become the centre of attention for your home.
These are just some of the toys which have helped revolutionize things at home. There are a plethora of them out there, and if you need to look at every one of them and then decide, perhaps a simple Google search on “Top Ten Tech Toys for kids that help in coding” would suffice.