LaTexican, the materials wouldn't necessarily all be for my toddler to use.
It's just that we have several young children who tend to roam in a pack. The little ones want to do whatever the big ones are doing, and vice versa. Because of this, small-parts items are a big pain right now, and probably will continue to be a problem for the next couple of years. I try to keep them to a minimum, and have a strict rule of keeping them out of the family room, which is the children's main play area and hangout.
I tried following the link that you posted, but it just came up with some bins of plastic toddler toys. Were you talking about the Learning Resources parquetry blocks? We have those, and they're great. Unfortunately, the pattern sheets are flimsy cardboard that's easily bent. I've been trying to avoid laminating them, as it makes the pages slippery, but I think I'll have to do it anyway.
The Trio looks like it would be lots of fun for my gang, but apparently it's a choking hazard.
I wonder if that applies to the blocks themselves, or just the accessory doo-dads?
On a more positive note, we just got a catalog in the mail from the Constructive Playthings school division, and they have a few neat things.
* Duplo-compatible
letter and
number bricks. These are chunkier than the ones sold by Lego Education, which are more like thin tiles (I'm not sure if they're even toddler-safe). The set doesn't seem to include any math symbols, but I can make my own with stickers. I'm not sure what we'd use these tiles for, but I'm sure we could come up with many ideas. At the very least, they'd be a good alternative to the little plastic fridge magnets.
The
Duplo wall play sets would go very well with these tiles, but holy cow, that's a lot of $$$. I'm thinking I could make something similar by sticking a couple of green baseboards onto the wall with 3M adhesive strips, or even just by clipping one to an easel.
* Jumbo 10x10 clear plastic
pegboard with chunky pegs. I'm thinking we could put velcro dots on the back and attach homemade activity sheets, similar to the ones that come with
this smaller pegboard from Quercetti. Instead of just having pictures to copy, we could also have patterning activities, a hundred square, a place value chart, some basic geometry, and who knows what else.
Both items are a bit pricey, but cheaper than hiring someone to keep an eagle eye on my toddler all day.
Amazon also has a
jumbo checkers set that says it's safe for all ages. Not too exciting, but the checkers could be used as pieces for other games.
And here's another possibility for the "golden math beads": buy a bunch of
cheap orange ping-pong balls, drill holes in them, and thread them on dowels.
I'll do some experimenting in the next few weeks, and report any positive results on the Recommended Resources board.
