More children are able to read and write before enrolling in grade-1 thanks to the educational toys that provide learning through play, educationists have said.
Since schools and parents started realising the importance of such toys, their demand has gone up in the local markets, the traders told The Peninsula.
Also, teachers of kindergartens said that they noted significant improvement in the performance of children thanks to the newest scientific gadgets and playthings. The tools are very helpful in attracting the concentration of kids.
“Earlier, there were a number of students who could not read and write properly in KG classes but now you can find only one or two kids in a maximum of 20 students in my class in this category who might not focus on learning due to some reasons,” said Umm Abdullah, a KG teacher of an International School.
“Our school administration has provided the most advanced educational toys and computer programs to help the students learn fast. The kids are showing very much interest in play and learning devices. The most interesting tool that has won the hearts and minds of the children is magical e-pen (reading pen),”she added.
Magical pen is a unique education tool, in the shape of a pen that recites the written text or dialogue by the characters. When readers use the magical e-pen to touch a book, the pre-loaded audio file is activated and spoken by the speaker inside the pen.
"There are varieties of toys in my school to help the pre-school kids recognize ABC - letters, numbers, shapes, and colors," said Aisha Ahmad, a nursery teacher.
The educational toys are not only helpful for the children but they also provide comfort to the teachers.
“We were used to reading repeatedly the alphabets and poems for kids to teach them and got tired. But now we guide them and machine supported educational toys read and the children learn and enjoy," said a teacher.
“We are supplying more than 100 varieties of educational toys to about 200 schools across the country,” said Abu Salman, a trader of toys. “These products are high in demand including sensory mood lights and tables, gross and fine motor skills and construction blocks and sets for pre-school children. Others are in maths category including shapes, geometry, measurement devices like mini number balance, easy digital scale, junior meter stick, among others.”
“The demand for educational toys is increasing in the local market. Schools are always looking for the most advanced tools of learning and so whatever we offer, they buy, if convinced. We imported about five containers in a year from the USA, Germany, Spain and China. The prices of educational toys range from QR25 to QR2,000. Chinese products are cheaper by about 50 percent compared to those from other countries, and they are the most selling items.”
“Our products have also attracted parents who approached us through schools when they saw any tools there during their visits to schools.”
"We expect that demand for educational toys will increase as parents want more intellectual games for their children," he added.
“We are fed up with electronic devices used by our children for long hours,” said Umm Ayma, a mother of two children.
"I preferred buying educational toys to divert the attention of my children from cartoon and other TV programs regardless of their price. I want to see them busy in playing and learning with educational toys," she added.
