The best Toys for building and construction toys for 1- 3 year olds
Building toys for 1 year olds
Children start learning to build and connect toys together even before their first birthday. When choosing these type of toys for a one year old I would recommend buying based on what your child is able to do independently.
For example: A complicated marble run might be something that your child enjoys watching but at age one is unlikely to be something that they are able to put together themselves. However a few well sized wooden blocks may meet your child’s abilities as well as developing skills perfectly.
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7 great building toys for 1 year olds
- Soft blocks
- Montessori tower
- Wooden blocks or mirror blocks
- Duplo and base plate for building
- Stacking cups
- Joining tubes
- Big beads
Building and construction toys for 2 year olds
By age two we start to see children becoming more coordinated in their ability to build and connect toys. They may still need your help getting started and learning to lift and build with each new type of toy but with lots of practice (read: play time) they will master many new skills in this year.
The below suggestions are merely that, suggestions. If you child is particularly interested in building you may choose to really invest in this type of toy but remember that they do not have to have every type of block that was ever invented.
7 fun construction toys for 2 year olds
- A wooden rainbow
- Magnet tiles
- Squigz
- Sumblocks
- Flat blocks
- Bristle Blocks
- Medium sized beads or stacking beads
Great building toys for 3 year olds
By three children are able to not only build with blocks but use what they have built in more complex play. Meaning, what they build begins to serve a purpose within play. We see a shift from the simple building of block towers to now building car garages, castles and fortresses.
As children at this age are really starting to extend their building play you will need to have a good quantity of whichever typoe of blocks or toys they favor. In my own experience, I have seen with many children that having just a handful of say magnet tiles or LEGO really limits what they will build. You want to have enough of one type of building material to invite this new phase of building with purpose.
With that being said, it doesn’t mean that you will need every single type of building toy for your 3 year old. Follow the type of toy that they seem drawn to and invest in building a good set in that specific type of toy (for example magnet tiles vs. traditional wooden blocks vs. LEGO).
At this stage you may also want to create a table or area specifically for building. This could be a shelf like this to store and build LEGO or perhaps a train table like this for building with blocks.
6 great construction toys for 3 year olds
Building and construction type toys often pair nicely with figurines and small dolls (see recommendations here) as well as pretend play objects like a tool set (see recommendations here)
Looking for more ideas? Head back to the ultimate gift guide for 1- 3 year olds.