A Toy from the Toyless Country

I found this on the corner of a shelf in St.Vincent de Paul Shop in Paddington. Some one must have brought this souvenir from Nepal. It looks like a toy for the children there but actually it is not. Things like these are only for the tourists.

Children in Nepal almost never play with toys. And yet research has shown that playing with toys is one of the important ways that children learn about the world. For instance, in one study in the United States showed that the most consistent predictor of IQ was availability of play materials. There are many more studies with similar conclusions. The results of this deficiency are often plain to see. Nepali children often manifest a lack of problem solving ability that comes from a tendency to not see the world as whole, interconnected, orderly, and consistent. We hope that by teaching Nepalis about the importance of toys, and by distributing them freely among the children, that we can help to reverse this trend. (Tiny Hands Nepal : http://www.tinyhandsnepal.com/dev.htm )