I am the parent to a 5 year old as well as working as Early Years Practitioner. My child already loved block construction and we have a variety of blocks, though most are second hand, mismatched in sizes and we had never had an Oplay product before.
Recently, I have been noticing how my child’s indoor play has become even more complex and elaborate, often involving balancing large constructions of blocks, to build architecturally or to support bridges train tracks, roads and vehicles. For me, selecting a toy for my child always comes from observing his interests and recognising gaps in what we have already. I had come across Oplay and loved the wide rainbow as it seemed perfect for incorporating into these complex constructions as it was the perfect size for lots of toy vehicles, I could see it fitting in well as bridges.
Immediately my child was using the rainbow in ways I hadn’t envisioned. The first construction involved using it to support a complex track that went from the floor, up onto a footstool and over, holding up the track in a way that he had been trying to achieve before with a stack of blocks , resulting in a lot of tumbling dow and having to rebuild! With the rainbow he was able to realise his idea easily, without the frustration of using all his smaller blocks which simply were not he right scale for the plan he had in mind.
The size of the set is very generous, tall enough for it to be used as bridges over vehicle roads and wide enough for toy cars and trucks to drive over. I love how the natural wood finish keeps the piece neutral, so it is easy for my child to reimagine it. The surface is also matte so it has more grip for little wheeled toys to balance and not just slide off.
When tipped upside down, to form a rocking shape, my child has loved placing cuddly toys in it like a cradle or ‘nest’ sometimes wrapping them up in a small blanket too.
One of my favourite contractions was using jigsaw boxes to construct a ‘postbox’ he used one wide rainbow piece as the letter opening, and sealed the top with a cushion. He loved finding empty envelopes and using the Christmas cards to get us to ‘post’ them while he acted the postman and delivered them to different rooms in the house. The rainbow worked perfectly and I could believe the imagination and vision in using the toy in this way.
My child will often like to combine the rainbow tie other blocks we have, smaller pieces to lift it up, or build into a more complex building like a station or cave. He likes leave a ‘set up’ of toys, buildings, track, roads, cars, animals etc for a few days and will come in and amend bits, change the layout and add sections. I have noticed the wide rainbow is easy for him to adapt quickly as it is sturdy and structural and he can easily grab and move without knocking down bits he has created by accident. He is using it in all his small world play without fail.
We have only had the wide rainbow for a few weeks and its already getting a huge amount of use, I can see him exploring new ways to use the shape, experimenting with the different sizes add am sure we will only keep seeing different possibilities for this toy in his play!
