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Victoria library toy boxes aimed at kids with challenges

Boxes of toys selected to help children with various challenges are now available at the Greater Victoria Public Library.
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Greater Victoria Public Library assistant Adrienne Else with a box of toys, one of 70 available for children with physical challenges or conditions such as autism.

Boxes of toys selected to help children with various challenges are now available at the Greater Victoria Public Library.

The Skill Builders Adaptive Toys Collection, created with the help of $10,000 from the Victoria Foundation, consists of more than 70 toy boxes containing three to five toys and a book, as well as information for parents concerned about a child’s development.

Contents of the boxes were chosen with help from the lsland Health’s Early Intervention Program, located at the Queen Alexandra Centre for Children.

Children with physical challenges or conditions such as autism are among those who were considered in the collection, said Rina Hadziev, the library’s collections and technical-services co-ordinator.

Hadziev said toys selected include balls with different types of surfaces and one of her favourites, sets of rubber handprints and footprints with a bumpy surface.

“You can feel them, you can use them as a path, you can play with them, so there’s a lot of very tactile, sensory things,” she said. “There’s things to make music with, there’s lots of colours. We really tried to focus on toys that would allow children to build all kinds of different skills.”

A choice of sizes is important, too, Hadziev said.

“There’s things that are really big because those can be a lot easier if you have problems with fine motor skills, and then there’s some things that are quite small because obviously, fine motor skills are [something] kids need to develop.”

The boxes contain a combination of adapted and commercially available toys, Hadziev said.

The goal is to encourage children’s development through play, said Queen Alexandra speech pathologist Megan Staniforth.

Hadziev said the earlier children can get assistance through things like toys, the better it is for their development process.

While most of the toys are for ages three and up, the boxes won’t specify an age range, because mental and physical age varies too much, Hadziev said.

Though they have been created for children with various needs, the toy boxes can be borrowed by anyone, she added.

jwbell@timescolonist.com