I walked about The Early Learning Centre yesterday for the first time in a while (mabye a couple of years to be precise!) but what struck me as I wandered around was, 1. the sensory overload of brightness and plastic, 2. the feeling of aggression from all the toys - in the way that they are so in ones face and 3. a sense of feeling overwhelmed by the whole experience. I know I was in a shop and surrounded by it all, but I had a similar experience in going to someones house with my 18month old nephew where plastic toys were in an abundance. He just sat not knowing where to look or what to play with because it was all so overwhelming (flashing lights, different noises, screeching, bright un-nutral colours). I have to add that the owners of the toys were running from toy to toy spending hardly any time with any of them and chucking them on the floor when they had had enough of them...hummmmmm good playing???!!! I think not!
Now, I know that I am probably in a minority here but when one really stops and looks at what we are putting infront of children to play with do we really stop and slow down enough to think is this nurturing for my child? After all this I did buy Arlo a plastic phone - shock horror! Well, he plays with ours, has broken ours and as someone said the other day the world is half plastic so we can't ignore it all the time - what it comes back to for me is bringing a sense of balance into all our lives.
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