Skills Guide

Learn more about the skills our toys are designed to develop!

Cognitive

Speech & Language

Creativity & Imagination

Fine & Gross Motor

STEM

Cognitive

Speech & Language

Social & Emotional

Creativity & Imagination

Fine & Gross Motor

STEM

Social & Emotional

Discover our social and emotional development toys for early childhood! These colorful toys promote important social emotional skills, like self-regulation, emotional competence, and more.

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Making friends, working with others, navigating conflict—these are just a few examples of social and emotional skills that help us communicate, play, and work with others!

Like other skillsets, the beginning of a child’s social and emotional development begins with basic building blocks, such as forming close and secure relationships with adults and peers, learning what behavior is acceptable in varied social, cultural, and familial contexts, and expressing emotions accordingly [1,2].

It’s also important to note that social and emotional skills go hand-in-hand; children often develop both skillsets at the same time [5]. In fact, emotions can be classified based on their relationship to social development: we are born with basic emotions, such as fear, joy, and anger, but develop secondary social emotions, such as empathy, love, shame, and envy, through interactions with others [5].

Emotional Competence

Emotional competence refers to the ability to identify one’s emotions, understand and react to others’ emotions, and realize that expressing emotions may have consequences.

Emotions are not only felt but can also be seen by others! These external expressions are called emotional cues and can take the form of sounds, words, looks (facial expressions), movements, postures, gestures, actions, or a combination of these forms [5]. Emotional competence includes the ability to read and respond to these cues.

Self-Regulation

Self-regulation describes the ability to manage and control emotional expressions. This skill develops through repeated interactions with others [5], as children discover and remember how others react to diverse expressions of emotion. For example, a child may not get what they want by expressing their anger through yelling. But after seeing how others react when they use words instead, they may learn to control their expression of anger in the future. As this skill develops, the child’s control of the emotion’s expression changes, not the emotion itself.

Self-regulation is closely related to cognitive skills: in order to self-regulate, kids need to remember past interactions as well as exercise their inhibitory control, which is the ability to restrict impulses and desires in order to behave more appropriately [2,4].

Social competence

A child is socially competent when they can interact effectively with others. This includes their ability to make and keep friendships, solve conflicts with others, play and work collaboratively, and adjust behavior based on social context. For example, recognizing that running around at home when they’re happy can be okay, but not in the social environment of a supermarket where they’ll need to regulate their emotions and express them appropriately [2,3].

Skills in this category can develop alongside prosocial behavior, which is defined as voluntary behavior to benefit others. For example, a child’s effort to interact positively with others through active listening and turn-taking shows their cooperation skills [2,3].

In Conclusion…

Social and emotional skills are just as important as other developmental skill sets. By learning them, kids can build healthy relationships with themselves and others!

Our Collection of Social & Emotional Toys

ABC Railway

Alphabet Learning Train Set

Alphabet Fishing

Magnetic Alphabet Fishing Game

Bright Explorer

Educational Light Box Playset

Dive & Discover

Ocean Learning Color Changing Book Set
Hot

EggXpress Yourself!

Match & Learn Eggs

I Am Responsible!

Magnetic Responsibility Chart

I Can Plan!

Magnetic Calendar

Knock-Knock Who’s Inside?

Lock & Latch Board

Lace-Up & Learn Animals

Fine Motor Wooden Lacing Toy

Learning Ladybug

Ladybug Counting Toy
Hot

Locbloc Counting Blocks

Educational Building Block Set

Mini Barista

Wooden Barista Playset

    References:

    [[1] Darling-Churchill, K. E., & Lippman, L. (2016). Early childhood social and emotional development: Advancing the field of measurement. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 45, 1-7.
    [2] Halle, T. G., & Darling-Churchill, K. E. (2016). Review of measures of social and emotional development. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 45, 8-18.
    [3] Junge, C., Valkenburg, P. M., Deković, M., & Branje, S. (2020). The building blocks of social competence: Contributions of the Consortium of Individual Development. Developmental cognitive neuroscience, 45, 100861.
    [4] Montroy, J. J., Bowles, R. P., Skibbe, L. E., McClelland, M. M., & Morrison, F. J. (2016). The development of self-regulation across early childhood. Developmental psychology, 52(11), 1744.
    [5] Wilson, R. L., & Wilson, R. (2014). Understanding emotional development: Providing insight into human lives. Routledge.

    References:

    [[1] Darling-Churchill, K. E., & Lippman, L. (2016). Early childhood social and emotional development: Advancing the field of measurement. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 45, 1-7.
    [2] Halle, T. G., & Darling-Churchill, K. E. (2016). Review of measures of social and emotional development. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 45, 8-18.
    [3] Junge, C., Valkenburg, P. M., Deković, M., & Branje, S. (2020). The building blocks of social competence: Contributions of the Consortium of Individual Development. Developmental cognitive neuroscience, 45, 100861.
    [4] Montroy, J. J., Bowles, R. P., Skibbe, L. E., McClelland, M. M., & Morrison, F. J. (2016). The development of self-regulation across early childhood. Developmental psychology, 52(11), 1744.
    [5] Wilson, R. L., & Wilson, R. (2014). Understanding emotional development: Providing insight into human lives. Routledge.