Daycare Toys/Equipment Must Haves?

[pootmcgoot]

What are your must haves? For your playroom? Convenience items tha make a world of difference? What are big hits with kids?

[sfp]

You can't go wrong with the basics... Cars/trains, dolls, blocks

[Kiki]

You can't go wrong with the basics... Cars/trains, dolls, blocks

This. Of all the toys we have in the toy room, the cars, blocks, and dolls are played with the most. I've heard from several people here that Little People are a huge hit too. I also have one of those old school Fisher Price Dr. kits that my mom found in a box of my old toys, the kids love it, it's another one of the top toys.

[spud912]

• Play food
• Plates/utensils/cookware
• Blocks and legos (a variety)
• Tools
• Doctor kit
• Books
• Puzzles
• Ride-on toys
• Plastic animals/dinosaurs
• Balls (variety)

I think my kids are the odd ones who dislike dolls. They also barely touch the stuffed animals and puppets. I would say the dolls get played with once every 3 weeks or so, if that.

[jokalima]

My kids play most with dolls and kitchen area, now they are in to trains.

[BumbleBee]

The kids at the center I worked at loved anything they could stack and knock down, dump trucks that they could load up with various items and then dump somewhere else in the area, play vacuums, dress up clothes and bubbles.

For me as a teacher, I couldn't live without my solid color water bottle (I could put pop in it and none of the kids would bug me for a drink), as well as shoes that I could slip on and off easily.

[Abigail]

Here everyone including the boys grab a purse or backpack (super small sized) and fill it with small items like keys, phones, bottles, blankets, links and carry it around and say they're going to work or going shopping while they carry a stuffed puppy in one arm and a baby in the other.

They LOVE LOVE LOVE building tours. They use toy pizza slices that velcro together and try to stack all six of them. They use actual blocks all the time, which right now i have out vinyl covered foam blocks. LOVE those!

I really want the 5 and 8 section laminate shelving so each section of the shelf has a toy. Right now I just have four foot long shelves that have 2-4 items per shelf but it's never evenly spread out.

1-2 wooden puzzles can be left out at a time. I do have typical cardboard type puzzles but only one is allowed out and I have to supervise because my kids are forgetful of how fragile somethings are and bend and forget what they're doing and put it in their mouth......they're 2.

I had push toys like shopping carts, strollers, and a lawnmower and ride on toys but all those got either put away or outside. When used inside they would go to fast and were unable to turn it if they needed and would push it into someone or a baby equipment item or over toys so those were not needed for toddlers inside.