Economist Writing Every Day

We at EWED are making recommendations for holiday gifts. This post is about items that my kids are actually using.

I’ll be putting up links for your convenience. I have gotten lots of kid stuff from neighbors, either buying through websites or just be getting hand me downs. I love the idea of re-using kid items and clothes.

FUN remote-control car. “RC Cars Stunt Car Toy, Amicool 4WD” It doesn’t get stuck. It can flip over and go over many terrain types. It’s not large, meaning it doesn’t take up a lot of room in your house, but it delivers a lot of fun! Can be fun both indoors and outdoors. ($25)

Bikes: You have probably heard about balance bikes. We started on a Strider balance bike (no wheels, kids just kick to go forward).

I wanted to make the transition from balance bike to pedal bike and skip the training wheels stage. I was able to do that, but another item was necessary. Get a pedal bike that is SMALL. I actually got mine from a neighbor, but I found a link that looks similar. The bike in the link has training wheels, but I assume you can take them off. If the wheels of their first pedal bike are SMALL, then they can’t get hurt and the can’t go very fast. My 5-year-old thinks this is really fun. I don’t have the headaches of either him getting injured or worrying that he’ll take off and be out of sight quickly.

Great cheap toy for a toddler. My 2 year old loves the Melissa & Doug Minnie Wooden Magnetic Dress-Up. This has inspired hours of play and conversation. ($10)

Let’s be honest. The kids are getting screen time. When the pandemic hit and daycare (temporarily) closed, I decided to get much more lenient than I had been before about screen time.

Magnus Kingdom of Chess is a great tablet game ($8). My 5-year-old son plays it on an iPad mini. I had made some unsuccessful efforts to interest him in real chess before buying the game. He loves the video game, but what’s amazing is that since he’s started playing the video game, he has become much more interested in playing actual chess with me. In fact, he asks me to play him in chess now. Before I used to worry that how would he even succeed if he hadn’t mastered chess by age 5. Now, he’s actually asking me to play him in chess and I’m thinking secretly ‘I don’t have time for this. Shouldn’t you be playing outside?’. (In our case, my son got some help from parents with playing the game. He might have had a hard time doing it completely by himself.) Let me be quite clear, my son has NOT mastered chess, but his understanding of the pieces really went up because of the video game.

There are also several completely free great apps made by Khan Kids and PBS Kids.