Subject:
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Re: A first step
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.general
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Date:
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Mon, 26 Jul 2004 06:28:37 GMT
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Viewed:
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1352 times
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In lugnet.general, Mark Jordan wrote:
> Yesterday was a wonderful first for our family. My 20 month-old daughter
> attached 2 2*4 bricks together for the first time!
Congratulations.
> My mother-in-law told me I shouldn't build Lego in front of my daughter. She
> thinks my massive colour coordinated, SNOT, themed and witty creations will give
> my daughter an inferiority complex and stunt her Lego development.
>
> Does anyone have an opinion on this? Does excessive AFOL enthusiasm cause
> problems for the kids?
I agree with Tim. I think the opposite is the case.
I have a six year old boy that was born four years before I came out of my 'dark
age'. However, he's had Lego almost from birth, starting with Primo (which he
wasn't really interested in) and progressing to Duplo and now he happily builds
with the 'little Lego' unsupervised, and can follow the instructions for smaller
sets without any help.
I also have a two and a half year old that started on the little Lego much
younger. In fact, he's not really interested in the Duplo unless the older boy
is playing with it. I have my 2xn bricks in an open tub under the Lego desk.
When myself and the older by are building he sits at my feet throwing bricks
together more or less at random. It was a proud day when he announced he's built
an aeroplane, and lo and behold, the object in his hands actually resembled an
aeroplane.
Anyway, after all that waffle, here's my take on the situation. I think it's not
so much what you build that's important, it's how you respond to what {they}
build. As long as you're encouraging and enthusiastic about whatever they build
they'll progress fairly naturally. Dougal is at the stage where he'll even
accept suggestions on how to improve his models and learns new techniques all
the time. Not having my problem of being a bit set in my ways, he's even shown
me a few connection methods that I'd never have thought of otherwise.
The hardest thing to do, I've found, is to put aside any ideas of what or how I
want to build, and build what he wants to build. That, and keeping his attention
focused long enough to finish what he starts, which is why I try do try to steer
him away from building anything too large for now.
As well as that, when his friends come to our house, they always want to check
out the Lego room and see what I've been building. The generally positive
response they have can only be an encouragment to build bigger and better
things. The parts are all there ready when he does (I don't limit his access to
the Lego room - he even allows sets of his own to be sorted into the rest of
it), and he's got an adult nearby to help who understands Lego as well or better
than any kid, which is more than can be said for most children.
Cheers,
Allister
ps. It's also interesting to get a six year old f.o.l.'s take on certain matters
that arise here. I do try to bring them up with him without putting any positive
or negative spin on them.
So, on the colour change his response was 'why did they do that?' closely
followed by 'they won't match with the pieces we have.' On the peach minifigs;
'I like them better than the yellow ones'. He plays with Jack Stone as happily
as any Lego, and thinks Lego Island 2 is a cool game despite it being one of the
slowest loading pieces of software since the Commodore 64 and it's tape drive.
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: A first step
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| (...) That worries me a little too - that because she doesn't see me enjoying Duplo, that she will want to try the "little bricks" too early and then get frustrated. (...) I wonder what my daughter's first MOC will be. Brought up with 70's feminism (...) (20 years ago, 26-Jul-04, to lugnet.general)
| | | Re: A first step
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| Having my now 9 year old son brought me out of my dark ages and we had many happy years discovering and sharing our Lego hobby together, but then the birth of my now 2.5 year old daughter put me in dark age II (no time, no money, my Lego room became (...) (20 years ago, 26-Jul-04, to lugnet.general)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | A first step
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| Yesterday was a wonderful first for our family. My 20 month-old daughter attached 2 2*4 bricks together for the first time! Its great to see the delighted look on her face when I open the box of basic bricks with its bags of pretty colours, the (...) (20 years ago, 26-Jul-04, to lugnet.general)
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