Tag: engineering

Every birthday and Christmas my husband and I go through the same conversation. What toy are we going to give the girls which is first, worth the cost and second, worth the space it will take up. I’m happy for my girls to have toys and fun things to play with, but with three daughters there just is a limit on how much stuff they actually need. As I think about toys now I think about what will inspire them. Lakeshore Learning is a company with inspirational toys. 

We had the chance to review the Giant Roller Ramp Starter Set. What a fabulous toy! This set comes with 17 sturdy pieces and a ball. Sounds simple, right? My opinion is that simple is often best. This toy has captivated my girls for hours as they experimented with a variety of configurations. 

The girls started out by following one of the many options of configurations included with the pieces. I was pleased to see how clearly they were presented so both Beth (6) and Rose (8) were able to build what they saw. The ladder parts are stackable and a variety of heights can be used. 

The ramps easily snap together for children. It took Beth a little longer to figure this part out, but soon she was jumping right with the building and snapping! They are made so any one ramp will attach to another which makes creativity easy. They are extremely well crafted so the constant building and rebuilding does not put stress onto the connection pieces. 

The included rubber ball glides smoothly on the ramps. The girls called it their tester. They used this first to see if it worked for them. If the ball got stuck they looked things over to figure out how to get it moving again. It has been so fun for me to watch them discover basic fundamentals of engineering while they are playing. 

Notice the toy cars in the background? After using their test ball the girls would try a variety of cars to see which one would work best. They had a handful of cars they liked best. This was Grace’s favorite part! She struggled a bit with the building, but boy did she like the testing! 

Before long Beth especially was ready to try her own setup! I thought at first she was just randomly building and I enjoyed seeing her work, helping her when she asked. Imagine my surprise when she used her test ball and she grinned up at me saying, “It worked just like I thought it would, Mommy!” I questioned her on exactly what she meant. If you notice the setup, she intentionally created a ramp which would cause the ball to end up right back where it started. She told me she wanted to do it this way so she didn’t have to get up and chase after it. Wow! Seeing my recently turned 6-year-old deliberately build model that functioned in a specific way she intended from the beginning was eye-opening to my understanding of how her mind operates.

My girls have played with this almost daily since we received it. Some days small balls roll down the ramps, sometimes cars, and sometimes little characters going on a water slide (this was mostly Grace!). This is a wonderful set which I recommend to anyone looking for a different type of toy for their child, one which will engage them longer than the current trendy toys and cause their imaginations to soar higher than you may have ever thought!