Does The Kid With The Most Toys Really Win?
After attending several recent birthday parties for young children
, I was amazed at the amount of toys one child could receive just for turning another year older. It reminded me of a conversation I had at Christmas with an 8 year old little girl. When I asked her what she was wanting for Christmas this year, she answered, I don't know, I have everything, just surprise me! I was utterly stunned.I never gave it much thought before, but this made me think does a child really need all these toys to be fulfilled? And can having too many toys be good? Don't get me wrong I love birthday parties, and I believe they should be celebrated no matter what age a person is.
I began to wonder are there side effects of having too many toys besides the obvious one of too much clutter in the house? I began to look into it and found that it does have a few side effects. You will find that too many toys:
Shortens Attention Span, Creativity & Imagination
If you watch small children in a room full of toys they will naturally go from one toy to another exploring what each toy has to offer. If too many toys are available to explore it can diminish their enthusiasm and decrease the chance that they will actually take time to play with any one toy. When this happens it decreases their creativity, imagination or observational skills.
If you notice that your child is bouncing from one toy to another you may want to limit the number of toys available to play with. That way they can give their full attention on a few different toys so they are not being easily distracted.
Takes Away the Specialness
When a child knows they have a lot more toys available to play with or that mom and dad will buy them whatever they want, there is no need to take care of any particular toy. The child's expectations have become greater than their appreciation.
As a kid did you ever wish for or wanted a toy that you knew your parents couldn't afford, or maybe you had to save up your own money to get? Remember how excited and proud you were when you finally got what you wanted. It might not have even been a big item, but you took care of it. Some of you may have even kept a few special childhood toys to this day. How many special toys will your child keep?
Overwhelms and Over Stimulates a Child
A US government-funded study regarding the effect of children with too many toys said children can get overwhelmed and over-stimulated and then they cannot concentrate on one thing long enough to learn from it. Also too many toys means they are not using their imagination when they play. What this says to me is by having too many toys we are limiting their ability to learn to concentrate or to finish what they started. And we are limiting their imagination by giving toys that do everything for them. I think a big mistake people make when buying toys for young children, is they get toys that can do a lot when they could be selecting toys that children can do a lot with.
Not Enough Play
Studies also show that when a child is given a new object they go through two stages, the first is exploration and the second is play. When in the first stage of exploration, a child is wondering what does this object do? During the second stage of play the child is figuring out what they can do with this? When they have too many new toys they take a lot more time exploring what the object does and taking very little time playing with it.
Makes Bored and Whiny Kids
We don't usually think that by having too many toys our children would be bored and whiny. Most likely we think the opposite to be true, that they need more toys to give them more to do so they won't be bored. However studies have concluded that children become easily bored and whiny by having too many toys because they become overloaded and over stimulated. Some children will throw the toys, and sometimes break them on purpose or be aggressive in their use. This goes back to no appreciation or respect for the item or who gave it to them. There is no reason to take care of the toy; as they have many more.
Not as resourceful
A child with too many toys will not learn how to use their imagination or creativity. A special study was done in which they removed all toys from a group of children for three months to observe what would happen. Not surprisingly these children invented games and used their imagination to play. They turned the chairs and tables into forts, houses, and invented their own games. They were resourceful to use what they had to have a great time. This study shows a child does not have to be resourceful when they have an abundance of toys.
Too Much Landfill
Last but not least, think about the amount of toys that just one child has and multiply that by millions of other children who have just as many, and ask yourself, where are all those toys going to wind up? You got it, in the landfills of our nation. If you are concerned about our environment you will want to teach your children by example, and limiting plastic toys is a great way to teach them.
I have heard it said that children who can use their imagination and creativity in play tend to be more emotionally secure. We as moms do the best we can and we want our children to be emotionally secure. Although it is sometimes hard to say no to a new toy it may be one of the best things we do for our kids.
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