TOYS FOR CHILDREN FROM THREE TO FIVE YEARS OF AGE.
Blackboard and crayon, building blocks, balls, train of cars, doll and cradle, wooden beads to string, small glass beads to string, rocking-chair, doll's carriage, books with pictures of trade life, flowers, vegetables, etc., tracing cards and paper dolls, toy poultry yard with fences, trees, a woman, and a dozen ducks and chickens.
The more advanced gifts of the kindergarten now interest the child. Clay modeling and paper folding can easily be taught him, and many of the simpler formulas for the mat weaving, also some of the sewing. A good kindergarten is the best play ground for a child at this stage of his development, as he needs comrades of his own age and ability. If a kindergarten cannot be had the mother must be as nearly a child herself as she knows how to be. Good, simple, wholesome stories now become a part of the child's life. They form the door by which he is later to be led into the great world of literature. Therefore, story-books may be numbered among the suitable toys for four and five year old children, though stories told to the child are better. Almost any mother who has her child's best interests at heart can simplify the old Greek myths as retold by Hawthorne in his "Wonder Book," or the Norse legends as given us by Hamilton Mabie in "Norse Stories," or the rich, pithy experience of the Teutonic peoples as collected in Grimm's "Fairy Tales." All of these contain the seeds of wisdom which the early child races stored away in childish forms, and therefore, they delight the heart of the child of to-day and aid materially in cultivating his imagination in the right way.
TOYS FOR CHILDREN FROM FIVE TO SIX YEARS OF AGE.
Kitchen, laundry and baking sets, balls, building blocks, picture puzzles, dissecting maps, historical story-books, outline picture-books to color with paint or crayon, trumpet, music-box, desk, blackboard, wagon, whip, sled, kite, pipe for soap bubbles, train of cars, carpenter tools, jackstraws, hobby-horses, substantial cook-stove, sand table, skates, rubber boots, broom, Richter's stone blocks, shovel, spade, rake and hoe, marbles, tops, swing and see-saw, strong milk-wagon equipped with cylinder cans, substantial churn, a few bottles filled with water, spices, coffee, sugar, etc., for a drug store.
Ordinarily children of this age still love their kindergarten tools, and can be led to do really pretty work with their mats, folding, pasting, etc. The fifth and sixth gifts[ [1] now come into use and aid the child in more definite expression of his ideas. More stories should be told, and the beginning made of collections of pictures for scrap-books, also collections of stones, leaves, curios for his own little cabinet. Many references may from time to time be made to the books to be read by and by, which will tell him wonderful things about these treasures. In this way a desire to learn to read is awakened, and soon the world of nature and of books takes the place of toys, except of course, those by means of which bodily skill is gained and tested. These later belong in general to the period of boyhood and girlhood.
To this list of Christmas toys is added a list of books suitable for Christmas gifts. Very handsome books are to be avoided, as the child delights in handling his own books almost as much as his own toys. The value of the right kind of books cannot be too much emphasized. Is not the food which you give to your child's mind of as much importance as that which you give to his body?
When your boy stops questioning you, he has not stopped questioning concerning life and its problems; he has turned to those silent companions which you have placed upon his bookshelf or on the library table. Shall heroes and prophets be his counselors, or shall "Peck's Bad Boy" and the villain of the dime novel teach him how to look at life? It rests with you.
There is a great difference between books which are to be read to children, those which are to be read with children, and those which are to be read by children.
The second kind, which are more profitable than the first, require the mother's sympathetic and genuine interest in the subject-matter in hand; and frequent stops for little talks about what has been read are necessary.