Squigz: 5 Ways to Play

Variety in play allows your baby to learn and develop in a variety of ways too. Suction toys encourage your baby to experiment with combining objects on a vertical surface. Our favourite suction toys are squigz, because they actually stick and they are durable, easy to clean and very colourful. 

Vertical surface play provides a different challenge for your baby and toddler’s balance and works the muscles in the back and shoulder girdle in a different way. PLUS they’ll love pulling the squigz off surfaces so there’s lots of opportunities to model language, get them to follow instructions and encourage them to ask for help. 

1. Moving on; vertical kneeling play-  2 point kneeling is kneeling upright on the knees. This is a great preparation for standing as your baby is learning to stabilise their position with the muscles around the hips and pelvis. Squigz stuck to the mirror, door or fridge will entice your baby into this position. Even trickier is to let go and reach with one hand, your baby should do this as they pull off and stick on the squigz.

2. Up and Away; standing play- Standing at a vertical surface is more difficult than at a horizontal surface as your baby can't take as much weight through their arms or use their arms as much to balance. Squigz also encourage your baby to let go with 1 hand making balance even tricker! This is the perfect play setup for babies who have been standing for a while but haven’t yet gained confidence to step independently. 

3. Sound play- some lovely early words to model for your baby are ‘onomatopoeias’ - these are words like ‘pop’ ‘bang’ and ‘splash’ where the word describes and mimics the sound of the object or action it refers to when spoken. Your baby will love these words as they are associated with something fun - making noise!! Model ‘pop’ as you pull the squigz off the surface and it makes a popping noise. 

4. Developing hand strength- squigz are even more fun as your toddler gets a little older and becomes better at combining them into complicated structures. Pushing and pulling the squigz into each other and attaching them to the surface will help to build your toddler’s hand strength, an important precursor for school activities like using scissors and pencils with a correct grip. 

5. Following instructions: Developing understanding of language is an essential part of language development - we can’t say a word if we don’t know what it means! Try giving some little instructions during squigz play to help develop this skill. You can give instructions containing action words (eg ‘put on!’ ‘Pull it off’ ‘put on the table’) or with colours (‘get the blue one’).

Squigz are a product from Fat Brain Toys. We love the online toy store Peach & Pip an Australian owned and operated store who stock several different types of Squigz plus tons of other good quality toys from Fat Brain and others! Follow them on instagram here!