Nowadays robotics and Artificial Intellingence are daily topics mainly because of the great progress achieved in the last years. These matters touch each of us more and more closely, just think of the attention aroused by Sophia, the first woman-robot to have received citizenship in Saudi Arabia. Also the toy world is obviously an active participant in the discussion and this is demonstrated by the large quantity of products that aim to develop the ‘skills of the future’ in children: first of all that of coding. Matatalab is one of these toys, a robot to teach coding born in March 2017 and which is already doubling the required goal of its first Kickstarter campaign.
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DESIGNEDUCATIONALTOY Blog
AN ESSENTIAL DESIGN TOY THAT DEVELOPS COMPUTATIONAL THINKING
Stimulate logic and creativity of children is a common mission for many toy companies. It is not easy, however, to find great distribution games that focus on this goal without go bad in already-viewed solutions or with an expected design. For this reason, we have noticed Cuboga, an essential design toy that develops computational thinking.
DESIGNEDUCATIONALTOY Blog
STUFFED ANIMALS TO DEVELOP EMOTIONS AND RELATIONS
The stuffed animals story has very far-reaching origins. The first traces date back to the ancient Egyptian and the discovery of puppets made with animal fur for recreational or religious purposes. The success of this toy, however, confer to a German lady who, at the end of the 1800s, began to pack teddy-shaped pillows, triggering a great interest among the toy companies. Since then, it is difficult to find someone who has not had at least one plush among his childhood games, as it is rare to find a re-design. That’s why it seems interesting to introduce you to Animoodles: stuffed animals to develop emotions and relations.
DESIGNEDUCATIONALTOY Blog
A TOY TO HELP CHILDREN IN CRAWLING
Innovation in toy design proceeds with giant steps; it is no coincidence that we use this expression because in this new article we present the Explore & More Follow-Bee Crawl Toy, a toy to help children in crawling.
EDUCATIONALTECHNOLOGYTOY Blog
A KIT TO TEACH CODING TO FUTURE ADULTS
Teaching coding to new generations is one of the trend topics nowadays. There are so many toys developed over the last few years that explore this topic, and are more or less effective in presenting educational solutions appropriate for various age groups. In this buzz stand out LEGO Boost, a kit to teach coding to future adults.
DESIGNEDUCATIONALTOY Blog
TO ENGAGE CONSUMERS CAN BE CRUCIAL FOR THE SUCCESS OF A TOY
In the age of 2.0 moms, those of social and virtual sharing, born Toucanbox, a bi-weekly kit that demonstrate how to engage consumers can be crucial for the success of a toy.
DESIGNEDUCATIONALTECHNOLOGYTOY Blog
THE FUTURE OF TOY DESIGN IN SIX KEY POINTS
Innovation moves fast in educational design and, moreoften than not, winks to cultural and technological trends. It has been understood by Fisher Price, the toys and kid’s products company with a 85-years history behind, which few months ago launched a ‘communication challenge’ with the video ‘The future of parenting’, or rather the future of toy design in six key points.
EDUCATIONALSenza categoriaTECHNOLOGYTOY Blog
A KIT FOR TEACHING ELECTRONICS THROUGH PLAYDOUGH
Who has never used playdough to create strange three-headed monsters or a dream car? It has been a masterpiece of the toy world since the beginning of 1990 and remained almost unchanged till nowadays. Colored or fluo, homemade or industrial, this magical substance has always fascinated children and adults up to be used by sculptors for their first plastic models or even win two Oscars in the animation with Wallace & Gromit shorts. A toy company has brought to an even higher level this material, by designing a kit for teaching electronics through playdough.
ARTEDUCATIONALTOY Blog
A KINDERGARTEN TO EDUCATE TO BEAUTY
“Beauty will save the world” is one of the most renowned quote by Fedor Dostoevskij. Frequently abused, this phrase was taking seriously by the founders of Baby Caring, a kindergarten to educate to beauty in Milan.
Baby Caring is a bilingual nursery born in a historically important building for the city of Milan: the Mantegazza Foundation, San Calcero 16 street. Here, Laura Solera Mantegazza opened the first kindergarten in 1850 with the purpose of helping female workers not to leave their children. A place that has been destined to host great and beautiful things since its birth has reopened its doors in March 2017.
The core philosophy of this Children Innovation Lab is “Who sows ideas, collects certainties”. The promise, on the other hand, is to educate to beauty, in all its artistic and conceptual nuances, children from 1 to 12 y.o. through a playful and artistic experience. The traditional formative programs are rewrote by the centrality of the child who becomes the active protagonist in modifying, consciously or unconsciously, his training path based on his tendencies and interests.
Education takes place primarily through the daily participation in works of art exhibited like a gallery inside the structure: interiors, as well as furnitures, are signed by big names of art and design; here we find ‘numeric’ paintings by Paolo De Cuarto and fairy wooden sculptures by Duilio Forte. Atelier Forte designed also ‘Ursus’, a big wooden bear that can be climbed and explored by pupils in total safety, demonstrating that in a kindergarten to educate to beauty no details can be omitted and that all contributes harmoniously to the play and educational experience. The workshops are important part of the program too and are designed by renowned artists; an example is Micro-Memory, curated by Armenian artist Liana Ghukasyan, where children are stimulated to create themed images on a paper created in laboratory, in order to make small books.
The educational proposal is based on the theory of multiple intelligences by H.Gardner, a contemporary american psychologist who theorizes the existence of multiple level development in the person, from linguistic to musical or video-spatial. This approach to knowledge allows to stimulate kids under different topics and underline their big potentialities, cultivating beauty and design values. Innovative teaching, in which new technologies and learning blend and promote, also through media and robotics, playful experiences to draw, compose music, design images and create stories.
At Baby Caring Mantegazza innovation touches organizational aspect too: the kindergarten is open all year round, 7 days a week and the tratitional annual frequency formula is flanked by the ‘time’ one that follow the parents working times. In this way school support the work-life balance of the family, so hard to find already in the XIX century at the time of foundation of the building, let alone in today’s society.
Baby Caring Mantegazza is a positive news not only in the world of education. In a historic moment where neglect or badness often prevails, a kindergarten to educate to beauty is what it takes to turn a quote into real hope.
DESIGNEDUCATIONALTECHNOLOGYTOY Blog
A WOODEN TOY SET TO APPROACH TECHNOLOGY
How to fight the surplus of technology during kids days? How to avoid all the time they spent in front of a tablet? How to make the moment of play both active and educational? These could be three of many questions that the designers at frog asked themselves in developing Yibu, a wooden toy set to approach technology.