Jigsaw Puzzles
He played with jigsaw puzzles in kindergarten two days ago.
A group of 6-7 kids crowded together on the floor over a difficult puzzle of probably 50 pieces, figuring what goes where. Amazingly, they managed to finish it (it’s a picture of many colourful balloons on a black background) even though they complained that it was too hard initially. I thought it was impressive team work and patience!
My son was initially with them when there were fewer of them on the floor, but when teacher swapped a few kids around, he was moved to the larger pieced jigsaw puzzle on the table for which he’s more suited.
I was surprised to see that he could find two sets of two pieces that go together and join them, with lots of frustration. He must have struggled to join them, cos teacher noted his frustration (I was in the toilet).
Perhaps it was that incident that prompted him to play with puzzles today.
This jigsaw puzzle set was bought in Tesco for about RM20-25. It’s very suitable for him - pieces are large, it’s chunky, it’s a picture he loves (a construction site with cement mixers, cranes etc!). They have it in other themes for kids who aren't as crazy over vehicles.
It’s actually a growth chart but it’s now a little frayed at the edges so it’s unlikely to be used as that. He was much better at this than the one in school. Perhaps that’s because he’s already familiar with the picture, having played it with me several times.
When I went back to his room, I was surprised to see that he managed to join several pieces together by himself! I helped him a little with the bottom right portions in the photo above.
I was amused to see him checking the picture on the box, and figuring things out. But then I lost my patience so I did a few more rounds of leaving him to it, coming back to check on him, and then I had a quick shower.
I took the photo after my shower, and then helped him piece the 3 large portions together. He did the left portion and the top right portions entirely by himself. For him, that’s really good!
Thinking puzzle
The next puzzle he wanted was not a jigsaw puzzle but a brain/IQ puzzle. It still requires fine motor, visual perception skills etc.
I bought it in early Jan at a stall at the Putrajaya Immigration, of all places! I’ve been looking out for it at “stalls” in shopping complexes but not seen it since. Recently I found many types of brain/IQ/thinking puzzles in Jusco MV but are about double the price (but are larger, and likely to be better quality). My "Hide and Seek" game is most likely a “pirated” version as there are no details of the manufacturer on the box!
The strange thing with this puzzle is that when I first showed him how it was played (back in Jan), he seemed to pick it up instantly. I was talking to my aunt while he was with the puzzle. I showed him the challenge and he completed it without my help! I showed him the next challenge and he did it too. Those first few challenges had hints at the bottom but he still has to figure out which way to place them. After successfully completing 2 challenges, I praised him in front of my aunt. Then he couldn’t do the third challenge (which is of the same level of difficulty-beginner)!
We played it one or two more times since then, but he needed my help. He didn’t want to play with it at the other times that I’d brought it out. So do you think it’s a case of beginner’s luck or a case of lost confidence?
A few weeks ago, a friend brought her 6.5 yr old daughter for a visit and she played with that puzzle for some time. It might have been that incident that got my son interested in this puzzle again.
Knobbed wooden puzzle
This was the third puzzle he wanted. The pieces are knobbed so it’s much easier for him to handle, so I left him to it while preparing dinner. This was what I saw when I went back to his room.
The portion on the right is sequentially arranged. He might have been trying to arrange it alphabetically, but backwards from z, and either got stuck or lost focus. I doubt he was relying purely on memory to arrange it z-a cos when I asked him what came before “o”, he told me to “check here la”, pointing to the backing board! (in his arrangement, he missed out letters l, m, n)
Anyway, he was proudly pointing out that he made the word “bang”. When I came in the room, I managed to just catch a glimpse of him placing “n” in between “ba” and “g”. I don’t know if he intended to spell “bang” or it so happened that “ba” and “g” were there and he happened to be holding on to “n” (“n” comes before “o” in his arrangement of z-a).
After that, we played a while with that, changing letters to make new words (informally teaching him spelling & phonics). I've three sets of magnetic alphabets that I use for phonics activities.
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