Choosing an Educational Gift for a Child Aged 3 to 5

The holidays are just around the corner and you have no idea what to give your children or those of your loved ones? Because there’s a slew of toys and games available on the market, you can easily feel lost and have a hard time finding the best game for a child between 3 and 5 years old. Educational games are always great options as they can be fun while also helping kids develop their skills!

Necessary Skills for 3- to 5-Year-Olds

Young children grow up and learn quickly. Educational games are great to help them develop the necessary skills so they’re ready to start preschool or can practise what they learned in school. Here’s an overview of the skills little ones should develop, which can all be worked on through play:

• Emotional development: Learning, managing and recognizing emotions;
• Social development: Establishing positive relationships with others;
• Cognitive and language development: Gains in reasoning skills, attention and memory, as well as language, which enables children to learn to communicate;
• Psychomotor development: Gross motor skills help children engage in various types of physical activity and fine motor skills help children use their hands to achieve precise movements.

A Few Ideas of Educational Games for Little Ones

To capture the attention of children, educational games should be whimsical, while encouraging the development of skills. Parents shouldn’t see games simply as a distraction but as a way to learn, especially for children. In addition, play doesn’t only promote learning but also the development of adaptability skills and prosocial behaviour¹.

It’s therefore a good idea to offer various types of educational games to children so they can have fun while learning all the skills necessary to their overall development.

For psychomotor development, the cards Les Bougeottes are great as they encourage kids to move using colourful theme cards. Another interesting game is Abile & Agil by BougeHop, which was created by physiotherapists. These games encourage children to make different movements and work on their gross motor skills. Games like bowling are also good ideas. Play-Doh and kinetic sand can be great games to practise fine motor skills, and children like them a lot. Art supplies are also another option for improving those skills as they require kids to handle small objects.

Between 3 and 5 years old, children love pretend play, inventing stories or recreating situations they experienced. You could offer them toy food sets or a play kitchen to simulate a supermarket or restaurant. Toy animals also allow children to create stories and imaginary worlds. Those toys also encourage language development, just like the game Histoire de raconter by Placote. The latter includes several cards with different ideas to help kids come up with stories; it encourages children to talk and language development.

Board games are also good gift ideas for children as they encourage both social development and emotional development. For example, the game Seek & Find: Emotions by Placote can be played with family or friends and helps children identify and understand emotions.

The game Sans problème by Placote helps with social development as well since it’s played in a small group, and it also encourages cognitive development as kids have to solve different problems throughout the game.

The RESP as an Educational Gift Idea

Parents of children aged 3, 4 or 5 mostly focus on the present moment and their little ones’ preschool or elementary school journey. Post-secondary education seems very far away! Yet, now is the best time to plan for their future. The RESP is the perfect gift idea if you want to plan for your child’s education. When you open an RESP early, you receive more grants for your beneficiary and you accumulate more money. Plus, it’s an eco-friendly gift, since it’s obviously not a material object and because 100% of the money you contribute into your Kaleido RESP is invested responsibly by portfolio managers who take into account environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors. What about short-term benefits? Upon opening an RESP with Kaleido, you get access to a slew of exclusive accompanying services to help your children reach their full potential². All in all, the RESP makes a great educational gift that offers many perks for the future as well as for right now! Ask our team for more information today!

Also looking for ideas for older kids? Discover our gift ideas for children aged 6 to 11 and our gift ideas for teens aged 12 to 17. You’ll certainly find inspiration to get them games that are both fun and educational!