I felt a twinge of sadness reading about the demise of Toys R Us....almost felt as though a piece of my childhood, perhaps even a slice of innocence, has silently disappeared.
The retail landscape is fast changing, but the loss of a major toy retailer feels very acute as it holds so many family memories and now I sense there is a whole generation of children who will be getting the large part of their “play” quotient from electronic gadgets and tablets and not from playing with actual toys and games.
Whilst I applaud the advance of technology and love the many benefits it gives us all, I can’t help but think that the fading away of playing with toys on your hands and knees on the floor and the interaction with family and friends in the process is a key part of early social learning. Once the ubiquitous tablet has been introduced to a child, nothing else seems to come close thereafter and suddenly the toy cupboard seems much less attractive.
We all talk of being time poor but last time I checked there were still 24 hours in a day and I think it’s a sort of arrogance to perceive that somehow our time is more precious now than it was a few years ago - it’s only perception and the recent phenomenon of having 24/7 access to a cornucopia of messages, videos and games that simply didn’t exist a generation ago fills whatever amount of time you let it.
I embrace change, but the reduction of playing with actual toys seems to me to be a retrograde step - children grow up very fast now and since we are adults for the huge majority of our lives, it seems a shame to pass up on any of those innocent carefree days playing with toys....
Anyone for a game of Kerplunk...?