Designing Age Appropriate Puzzles

[Arcy]

Hi all,

My niece turns 4 at the end of the month and I want to make a puzzle for her, but I'm not sure what the appropriate complexity is for that age.

Are there any general guidelines for this beyond keeping the pieces large enough that her little sister (16 mos) can't swallow them?

I'm thinking of cutting the letters for her name and a few animals as individual pieces rather than an interlocking jigsaw type puzzle. I'll probably add gripper knobs.

How old do kids generally have to be before they start on interlocking puzzles? My nephew is almost 6 and will get something a bit more complex, but I'm not sure how to judge how many pieces are enough to be fun but not so many as to be frustrating.

I know a lot of this will depend on the kid, but are there any generalizations?

Thanks,
Rob

[wood-n-things]

Great question.

I found a couple of pamphlets but probably more information than we need to know. LOL

http://www.toyassociation.org/AM/Tem...CONTENTID=1389

http://www.cpsc.gov/CPSCPUB/PUBS/286.pdf

This one is very interesting.
Main Page for Everything Related to Kid Jigsaw Puzzle including Wooden Puzzles

I'll keep digging as I have 3 small granddaughters as well.

Here is something..
Pre-Schoolers: Three to Five Years

Pre-schoolers are masters of make-believe. They like to act out grown-up roles and create imaginary situations. Costumes and equipment that help them in their pretend worlds are important at this stage. Some of the many possibilities include pretend money, play food, a toy cash register or telephone, a make-believe village, fort, circus, farm, gas station or restaurant, a puppet theater and play with dolls and doll furniture.

In a child's private world, a favorite toy is both a companion and protector. Dolls and teddy bears, for example, have helped countless children to cope with difficult moments. Children will sometimes express their feelings to toy "confidants" and share emotions with them that they might otherwise keep to themselves.

Transportation is fascinating to young children. Trucks, cars, planes, trains, boats and tractors are all fun at this age and beyond. Larger outdoor toys, including gym equipment, wheeled vehicles and a first two-wheeled bicycle with helmet and training wheels, are appropriate now.

Visualization and memory skills can be sharpened by play that requires use of imagination or mental computation, with the introduction of board games, electronic toys and word and matching games geared specifically for this group. Construction sets, books and tapes, coloring sets, pains, crayons, puzzles, stuffed toys and dolls continue to be favorites.

[Carter-Johnson]

Children have a wide range of interest in puzzles and ability to put them together. My son has two boys. One isn't much interested and the other was assembling five and six-piece interlocking puzzles on his 2nd birthday.

The secret, in my view, is the picture. Go out to the local book store and buy a couple of calendars from last year at a discount. Go for Bob the Builder, Pooh, the Wiggles, Po-Ke-Mon or whatever the child likes. Glue them to 1/4" wood and start cutting out the major figures. You do not need a pattern. Cut these into 5 to 10 piece puzzles WITH interlocking pieces. Kids who like puzzles get great satisfaction over when they fit (lock) together.

There are no rules for how much complexity a certain age can work with. I do advise you to cut the puzzle with a blade thicker than that which you might use for an adult. Use a regular 2/0 or 3/0 blades.

If the above works and is met with skill and enthusiasm, then go for your letters imbedded in puzzles and other tricks. Increase the complexity until they get bored before they finish.

Have phun..... Carter

[sawdustus]

Great reply Carter. You hit all the points dead on. By age 4 most kids can handle puzzle piece without pegs and 10 to 15 piece puzzles are usually not past their ability, if they have the interest. Arcy, take Carter's advice on picture sources and go for the ones that are of interest to your niece. If she is anything like my granddaughter, it's princesses all the way down. Have fun and let us know how you make out.

george

[sdguy]

Judy Peterson's rule of thumb for number of pieces is age + 2. I.e., for a 4-year old, six pieces is about right. That seems to fit with what I've observed for puzzles I've made for my kids.

[GrayBeard Phil]

Rob:

Two points:
1- Under 5 yrs old, keep the kerf wide like a #5 blade. Fine muscle co-ordination in hands and arms comes latter. Frustration with a puzzle will spoil a child's fun.

2- Don't forget the child's Mom. Putting the toys away after play seems to be a universal thing. Too many pieces, and no easy way to store the pieces....well we've all been there. IMHO, that is why puzzles for very young tend to be tray puzzles, storage after play. 8 and 9 year olds sometimes are insulted by tray puzzles, in my limited experience.

Don't take my word for it, go to a Toy' R US store, and use a critical eye on what they are selling for the different age groups.

Phil

[utbva]

I made some puzzles of the Disney Princesses that were on some small callendars for some young girls and some of the mothers told me that their 3 to 4 year old girls loved putting them together. I made these as tray puzzles with 12 to 14 pieces but I did not interlock them. They are about 5-1/2inches square. I made them as "push to place" puzzles and I used the FD puzzle blades to cut them. I guess you really just need to make a few puzzles and see how the kids like them and then go from there. My grandson loves the ones that I made of the "Disney cars" and he just turned three.

[Little flower]

I have made many personalised puzzles using photos of the person it is intended for. This gives a puzzle a whole new dimmension for the receiver. The four photos attached will give you an idea of what I mean. Unfortunately I haven't been in the habit of photographing all my finished works and so only one of the photos is of a finished puzzle. However the others are three other of my designs that got turned into puzzles anyway. The instructions for the boyracer puzzle was simply - "he's into boyracer cars, what can you do?" They loved it. The Best Mates puzzle was made for our grandson when he was four and he could do it then with a little help - good for teaching him to 'look for....". The beach walking is my little grandaughters.

1. I take the photo and manipulate it in eaither word or publisher to get my desired look. You may have other programmes you like using and that part doesn't really matter. If the photo is not a digital image, you can still scan it in. Once inserted in my document I size it up to an A4 size leaving a boarder. The boarder makes it easier for a child to do the puzzle in and makes it easier for packing away. Make sure the photo is about 2 megs or greater to get a good look once it is enlarged.

2. The next part is where you can be as creative as you want to be. Maybe add a name, date, pesonalised message or go 'all out' as I did with the 60th puzzle. (The guy was into country & western and I was given a photo of him on a bus trip acting the fool in dressing up. This puzzle went down as a real hit at his party!)

3. Print it on a coulour LAZER printer. You can even enlarge it further at this stage if you wish.

4. Glueing: I have tried all sorts of glues and recently changed to using wallpaper paste and finding this the best method. Paste the side of the board you are going to attach it to and let it dry and cure for a couple of hours to seal it. (I use MDF board.) Then paste the board again and sort of roll the pattern on it to prevent air bubbles getting trapped. If you have a problem with this just peel it off and start with another copy. Leave it till the next day and seal with a coat of polyurethane or some plastic type finish before cutting.

5. Use a minimum of a #5 blade for children. Cut in whatever design you want. Freehand can make it very interesting and a bit easier for children as you can cut out faces or arms or whatever. Traditional shapes can also be cut. In one of the latest SSW&C issues there is an article on how a pattern can be used for this. I have used that method for years and have explained it here before. Probably many others have done it like this in the past too.

6. Sand the back of the puzzle pieces.

You may like to try a bit of fun with photos yourself. Good luck!

[iohonnes]

I would recommend a couple items.

1) use an image that's familiar to the child, like disney characters and the like.
2) avoid images with large "dead" spaces, like large expanses of look-a-like sky
3) Use interesting interlocks so that the child can use shape and color to determine the piece location. By this I mean using varying interlocks (shapes and sizes). You can also compensate a little for "dead" space with interesting interlocks.

Here's a puzzle my almost 4 year old son does in his sleep. He didn't care for it at first, but in the last month he just want gang busters on it. And, of course, he loves Lighting MacQueen.

If I were to do it again, I would use a #3 blade (I used an puzzle blade). At first, he had a hard time putting the pieces together.

John

[Arcy]

Thanks all. That gives some good guidelines.

Mike, "Pre-schoolers are masters of make-believe" is a perfect example of my niece. Nothing is what it looks like to adults. One of her favorite activities last month in Mexico was serving "ice cream". To those less in the know, it looked like a spinning top....

Carter, unfortunately she's 1700 miles away, so I can't readily iterate to find her specific level. I only get to see her once or twice a year, so I want to get as close as I can the first shot. Your comment on the satisfaction of making things fit is well taken. I'll definitely use a larger blade than I do for adult puzzles.

George, you nailed it. Princesses. Princesses. Princesses. Last winter, she had a different Disney costume every day. 8 days of חנכה plus 8 Disney princesses equals one very spoiled child (actually, Mom bought them all on sale just after Halloween).

Phil, good idea on going to the toystore. Of course, I try to make my own gifts so I don't HAVE to go to the store, but I can suffer it She's only halfway to 8, so I'm not too worried about offending her yet.

John and Bill, thanks for the examples. I think I was aiming a bit too young (but good for her sister and cousin soon), and will up the complexity a bit.

Teresa, I love the boy-racer collage. That's more or less what I usually do (but minimal photoshopping as a matter of taste, and I prefer real photo paper to what I can get in my printer). I've probably cut more photo puzzles than all other scrollsaw projects combined, but none appropriate for children. If people want to see my travel pictures they have to assemble them first

I'm not going to use a commercial picture source (sorry Disney!). The idea which prompted this was a name puzzle, so I'm going to start with that. I'll either make the surrounding designs a bit more complex than I had originally intended (possibly animals built from a few different interlocking pieces) or just do the name and do a second photo puzzle.

Unfortunately, the best pictures I have from this year are very close up and I don't like cutting faces apart . I do have some really cute photos from last year with the princess costumes.

Even if she doesn't like these, I expect her parents will so it won't be wasted

--Rob