Timpani: Toys that Inspire Mindful Play and Nurture Imagination
Each year, The Center for Early Childhood Education conducts research to look at how children interact with toys in their play. The annual empirical study looks at how young children in natural settings play with a variety of toys and identifies toys that best engage children in intellectual, creative, and social interactions in preschool classrooms.
Magna-Tiles by Valtech were chosen as a Timpani Toy for 2013 along with the toy My First Railway by Brio!!
The results of this study were announced on December 4, 2013 by Eastern’s Center for Early Childhood Education. From the Press Release:
“Today’s announcement of the highest-scoring toys in the fifth annual TIMPANI Toy Study demonstrates the depth of empirical research that is occurring at our Center for Early Childhood Education,” said Eastern President Elsa Núñex. “At the same time that Eastern faculty and students are identifying and testing toys that promote the intellectual, social, and creative deployment of children, we are also helping out students prepare for careers as professional early childhod educators.”
“It’s not surprising that Magna-Tiles did well,” said Professor Jeffrey Trawick-Smith, the Phyllis Waite Endowed Chair of Early Childhood Education at Eastern and the study’s principal researcher. “They have been nominated every single year that we’ve conducted this study – teachers and parents recognize their value… they tend to inspire a lot of problem-solving as children figure out how to construct different objects, but we also see a fair amount of pretend play and social interaction.”
Valtech Magna-Tiles Blog 