Five Ways to Fire Your Child’s Imagination.

Imagination is a great power. With the help of imagination we can fly to the moon, find ourselves on a desert island or hunt for a treasure in a rainforest whenever we want. Thanks to imagination the humanity enjoys such inventions as plane, computer or lump bulb. And the world wouldn’t have admired the beauty of Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, Michelangelo’s sculpture of David, Eiffel’s tower if it wasn’t for the great minds who had rich imagination to create all these masterpieces. Some of the great inventions were originated in the inventors’ childhood and evolved with their growing up. That’s why it’s crucially important to help kids develop healthy imagination. Every child has the potential to develop the imagination but it doesn’t mean that parents should just let it expand itself. On the contrary, parents should encourage the imagination of their little ones since early childhood. There is a variety of ways to do it.

Read fairytales to your child. Choose books with lots of big, colorful pictures of high quality. Don’t underestimate paper books because e-books don’t create such a special romantic and dreamy atmosphere as paper books do. While reading show your little one these pictures, explain everything what is drawn on them – how else can you imagine that you have a unicorn if you haven’t seen one? Discuss with your child what could happen with a character at the end of the story and then compare with the book. This simple activity teaches children to predict the outcome making them involve their imagination.

Read short verses that are written specially for little kids. Children love to learn and repeat such verses often making up their own by analogy.

Storytelling is as good as reading books. Fairytales that you make up inspire your little one to create her own stories or add new details to yours.

Provide your kid with appropriate props. It’s not necessary to spend huge sums of money on beautiful and expensive toys that will occupy your kids for a couple of days, tops. All these little copies of the real world deprive our kids of imagination forcing on the little ones grown-ups’ rules of the play. Choose the toys that do not make the kid to leave her fantasy world. Let you child use surrounding objects as toys and decide herself what to do with them. It can be anything, the simpler the better: a card box can become a computer or a bed for a sick teddy bear; a towel turns into a magician gown, a plastic bottle is a great ship, an empty paper towel roll can become a rocket or a spyglass. You might not even expect how regular objects can be used!

Encourage pretend play. Provide your little ones with good props and a place where kids may build a store, house or a hospital. Don’t just stay apart, join the play! - become a customer, a patient, a student. Your sincere participation will encourage your son or daughter to create and imagine more and more. Probably the main benefit of role playing is that children learn to think creatively and acquire problem solving skills. The researches show that people with rich imagination are able to generate various ideas how to handle unforeseen or complicated situations.

Crafting and board games are a great fuel for developing kids’ imagination. Collecting puzzles or building Lego towers and cities, drawing, modeling and other craft activities encourage children to transfer images from their heads to the paper or play dough. The child may not only make the whole collection of materials at hand but also play with his “masterpieces”. Provide your child with paper, crayons, paints, markers, fabric, big beads, buttons… With your little help kids can arrange a home theater - props and script are optional since the only thing you only need is imagination!

Cut on the TV to less than 30 minutes a day since TV and video games curtail imagination development. Even if you allow your little one watch TV or use gadgets don’t just leave her alone but ask questions what she sees or does. However, do not exclude gadgets completely out of the child’s development. From cartoons the kid learns many basic models of behavior and also those models that she hasn’t come across yet but surely will in the future. Copying her favorite cartoon characters also enriches greatly child’s fantasy life.

Do not stay passive. The best you can do is to be attentive to kids and listen to stories she tells you, give her ideas for theater costumes, participate in adventures or tea parties. At the same time do not impose your own rules - let the kid be the head of her fantasy world. Imagination increases your child’s self-esteem and gives the feeling that everything is possible.