The hard edge bricks that fundamentally built the popular toy industry were created by a Danish master carpenter form Denmark. Ole Kirk Kristiansen purchased a workshop in the small town of Billund and began to build houses and furniture. When the Great Depression started becoming an intimidating force to close his workshop permanently, he reached for his real passion creating toys for kids in 1932. The time was even harder in 1934 for Kristiansen, combating the loss of his wife and raising 4 young boys and founding LEGO. While it is true Ole Kirk was not the first to create these plastic bricks, he was the first man to introduce the “Automatic Binding Bricks” and they were altered off a British inventor who created a comparable product called the “Kiddicraft brick”. The role Ole Kirk Kristiansen played in the evolution of popular toys is ingenious. His invention is still admired by young to old people all over the world today. Ole Kirk’s impact can be unstated through the candy colored bricks he produced, his significance as a pop culture icon, and lasting presence of his legacy of LEGO in today’s society.
The educational and artistic importance Lego has been long-lasting from generation to generation. In the beginning of 1930’s until now, LEGO bricks has been the driving force of self-imagination and expression for multiple people around the world. It has given a voice to kids, adults, innovation and technology. Generation after generation, LEGO advances forward, yet keeps its core values intact as a family company. Lego is an essential element of toy culture and unlimited boundaries of mufti media and education in the 21st century culture.
When Kristiansen first introduced the Automatic Binding Brick into homes all over the w...
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... some of the biggest box-office hits from comic book heroes of Marvel to mythical like the Hobbit or old stories of the Lone Ranger. Also the new ninja Ninjago was a huge hit and still is with kids of all ages. The technology has stormed from one spectrum to the next to bring old to new and invite all who want to play.
Annotated Bibliography
Robertson, David C. BRICK by BRICK: How Lego Rewrote the Rules of Innovation and Conquered the Global Toy Industry. First Edition. New York: Crown Publishing, Division of Random House, Inc., 2013. Print.
Herman, Sarah. A Million Little Bricks: The Unofficial Illustrated History of the LEGO Phenomenon. First edition. New York: Skyhorse Publishing, September 26, 2012. Print.
Lipkowitz, Daniel. The LEGO Book. Revised edition. New York: DK Publishing, October 1, 2012. Print.
www.lego.com N.P. Website. March 25, 2014.
In Hands-on Squishy Circuits, AnnMarie Thomas showed us how she took a home-made PLAY-DOH recipe and turned it into a science experiment. It’s amazing that three and four year old children play with something so revolutionary. We may not realize this now, but if we start introducing this stuff to these children, they’re going to become such intelligent adults. I ask myself this question everyday,”Do I want my child to be successful in life, or let them flip burgers at McDonalds?”. I want my child to be able to learn and succeed as they progress in life. This is extremely important for children these
As a child, Margaret always created things for her brothers. She made them sleds, kites, and other play things. When Margaret was twelve years old, she and her brothers worked in the cotton mill. Margaret witnessed an injury when a steel tipped shuttle fell from a loom. After witnessing the injury, Margaret was determined to create something that would prevent the shuttle from flying loose. Margaret’s first invention at the age of twelve prevented the shuttle from falling from the loom and was adopted by all the cotton mills.
made by a famous maker, but was only a student model which was made from cheap wood
Wilbur and Orville Wright grew up in Dayton, Ohio, in a home that allowed for the two to pursue their intellectual interests. The boys’ parents, Milton and Susan Wright, allowed their children to follow their creative instincts, and helped filter their energy into being creative. Mrs. Wright was a top mathematician in her class and very creative herself; she assembled many household appliances and even built playthings for her children (Garber 1). Both Wilbur and Orville frequently requested help from their mother for counsel on any problems they encountered in their undertakings as children. Their father, Bishop Milton Wright, who would normally bring home toys to help spark their creative interests, gave the two brothers their first material inspiration, a rubber band toy helicopter, early on in childhood (Garber 1). They created ma...
When Frank’s mother Anna was expecting him, she went to a Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia and ran into an exhibit of educational wooden blocks created by Friedrich Wilhelm August Frobel. These blocks were called “Froebel Gifts”, and were the foundation of his innovative kindergarten curriculum, where the child would spend much time playing this these, experimenting with ideas, would nurture the idea of architecture, in which Frank’s mother had dreamed of her son being even before she knew she was having a child.
Ibsen, Henrik. The Project Gutenberg EBook of a Doll's House. [EBook #2542]. The Project Gutenberg, 13 Dec. 2008. Web. 14 Mar. 2011. .
...using fine motor skills and some gross motor skills. Children this age have enough attention span to play with the Transformer for short periods of time, but may find it difficult to keep focused on the toy with other toys around. The Transformer cartoon may help the child figure out the actions of the toy. The additional environmental cartoon stimulus may foster enhance development temporarily. Paiget’s cognitive-developmental theory may be useful in the child’s adaptation of how he or she plays. The child may also be able to maneuver the toy but not be able to understand the concept or story of the Transformer. The child is able to understand the symbols that label what toys are and may also be able to better process parent’s teachings with symbolic knowledge.
The idea is to set up obstacle courses, and have your child try and guide the toy from the start of the course to the end of the course. Obviously, kids are not likely to get it on the first try, and so they will have to gradually figure out the right combination of instructions to get the Code-A-Pillar toy from the start of the course to the end of the course. Starting with easy courses and working up to harder courses really installs a sense of problem solving and critical thinking in the kids. Given how crucial those skills are in school and in life, it is really nice to give your kids toys that encourage those skills. While coding skills will not be useful until around 2030 (or whenever your young child enters university or college), it is still not a bad idea to introduce children to the basics of coding at a young age, given how prominent computers are in life (and let’s face it, they are only getting more
Simon, Scott. "Boy Builds Braille Printer out of Lego." NPR. N.p., 22 Feb. 2014. Web. 2014. .
The LEGO Group organization is famous due to its flagship product – colourful plastic bricks that can be interlocked to form a variety of figures, and then disconnected again. These binding bricks originated in a wooden form when the company was first established in Billund, Denmark by Kirk Kristiansen in 1932 (The LEGO Group, 2012), and today’s well known plastic version was introduced in 1958 (Rosenberg). The company’s head office is located in Billund to this day, and The LEGO Group remains privately owned by Kristiansen’s family (The LEGO Group, 2012). They currently sell toys and teaching materials in over 130 countries worldwide.
Aren't some toys so fun? Well, so were these toys from the 90's. The Barbie was a toy that many American girls played with. You can change the way she looked and she had a bevy of features. Another toy that enhanced a child's creativity was the Lego brick. These toys let children put the plastic bricks together to make cars, houses and more. The Furby was one electronic toy that you could take care of and play with.
Tim Stephenson was your typical small town, high school student. One day his shop teacher, Mr. Lane, gave an open ended assignment in which the students were to bring the materials from home to build something using the available class tools for woodworking, metallurgy, etc. This assignment was after they proved a certain amount of proficiency with the skill. Tim decided that his family farm could use a new gate for one of its pastures. He began to sketch what he called “the most beautiful gate” on a piece of paper with metal wagon wheels and wrought iron accents.
Toys continue to evolve and change with the technology available at the time. The relative affordability of tablets today combined with the portability and multifunctional capabilities poses a real threat to traditional toys. Manufacturers have the opportunity today to embrace the technology and evolve their toys or find themselves left behind as a new generation of companies take over the market.
During the 1800’s Great Britain’s empire stretched around the world, and with raw materials easily available to them this way, they inevitably began refining and manufacturing all stages of many new machines and other goods, distributing locally and globally. However, despite being the central ‘workshop of the world,’ Britain was not producing the highest quality of merchandise. When comparing factory-made products made in England to surrounding countries, most notably France, those products could not compare as far as craftsmanship and sometimes, simply innovation. It was suggested by Prince Albert that England host a sort of free-for-all technological exposition to bring in outside crafts into the country and also show their national pride.
Also on the horizon are smart objects. These objects are geared more to small children then those in high school or college. Objects with animations such as building blocks that can talk and light up to indicate to a child how to stack them correctly. Objects that will test a child’s spelling and reading skills. Smart books and tools that require a child to listen and react.