Intellectual Development means being able to communicate, to think both creatively and abstractly, to pay attention, solve problems, and develop keen judgment and a lifelong readiness to learn.

Comfort Through the comfort and responsiveness of an adult, preschoolers will learn how to handle their emotions and how to seek help when needed Parents Can: Support their preschooler's exploration and curiosity about her physical environment Child Will: Feel supported in risk taking and exploring Use her senses to discover properties and characteristics of things, such as those that float and those that sink Make connections between prior knowledge and new connections Parents Can: Stretch their preschooler's creative thinking by asking questions such as "How many different ways can you move your hand?" "How many ways can you say your name?" and so on Child Will: Feel supported to think about solutions from many perspectives Use his imagination and creativity Parents Can: Help their preschooler discover something new everyday, such as a gardening tool, a carpentry item or a dry bean, and ask, "What can we use this for – what do you think?" Encourage curiosity by modeling it Child Will: Enjoy the opportunity of learning new things with you Learn that the only way to learn about things is to ask and explore

Play Through opportunities for play, preschoolers will experience joyful, free, spontaneous moments of fun while also learning about themselves and others. Parents Can: Provide a variety of card games, for example, "Go Fish" or "Memory" Child Will: Learn basic rules of games, and how to take turns Practice matching, counting and memory skills Parents Can: Encourage their preschooler to create structures by offering a variety of building toys, such as blocks and lego Child Will: Begin to understand how objects relate in space Will use skills of planning, problem solving and creativity Parents Can: Encourage their preschooler to identify objects by using only her sense of touch. For example, make a "feely" bags with familiar objects inside Child Will: Practice making associations between form and objects without the use of the sense of sight Match labels to hidden objects Stimulate her imagination

Teach Through routines, and emotionally and physically safe and secure environments, preschoolers can learn how to think, solve problems and communicate. Parents Can: Play "I Spy With My Little Eyes," focusing on colours Child Will: Begin to recognize and label colours Begin to use the process of elimination to solve problems Parents Can: Use bath time and bath toys as an opportunity to experiment with concepts such as sink and float Child Will: Learn cause and effect through exploring (for example, light things float, pouring too much water in a cup will make it sink) Begin to understand the concept of weight Parents Can: Use toys such as cars, soft toys and dolls to sort from small to big Child Will: Reinforce his understanding of size Become aware of sequencing according to size Experiment with different patterns

Related Resources

Books for Children

The Little Hands Playtime Book: 50 Activities to Encourage Cooperation and Sharing