Welcome to Brick Town. A storm has washed away all the bridges, and if you look in your box, you’ll find a driver, a dog and some people who all need your help! The driver needs tunnels, and the people and animals need bridges to cross. Can you help rebuild them so everyone can get where they need to go in Brick Town?
Hi play mates! I’m Emma, a play culture researcher and mum of three who loves helping people (and especially kids!) play more. I’m here to share some ideas to help you take your LEGO® DUPLO® sets to the next level!
Making bridges is such a classic LEGO activity, it never gets old! So, when I was asked to explore ways of playing with the Brick Box, I chose to hero bridges.
All three of our kids have loved making bridges. Play science might explain why… bridge building and testing is one way kids learn the fundamentals of engineering.
The cleverness of how little people learn about how the world works through play continues to blow my mind! So, let’s get you on your way to having fun with brick bridges while simultaneously teaching engineering.
Start off by building the bridge on page 12 of the Brick Box instructions. Encourage your builder to do this as independently as they can so they can master the skill of bridge building with bricks.
It might take a few tries. Kids love repetition, so stay on this step as long as you like or they need. Kids’ focus and interest is the best signal of when to step back in play as their curiosity is doing the good stuff!
Encourage them to add more bridges around your play space with different pieces. You can return to the original story to bring Brick Town to life as each new bridge helps the people reach new places:
“This one goes to the zoo!”
“This one gets us home!”
“This person is still stuck!”
Get curious with your engineer about how the bridges of different sizes and shapes work. Some curious questions that could spark an experiment could be:
Does it hold together?
Does it wobble?
Can you make it bigger?
Which pieces work best for the different parts of the bridge?
Who can fit over it? What can fit under it?
If some of the bridges collapse… great, embrace the chaos! Great play is all about lots of experimentation. The more failures, the richer the play experience! So, celebrate those bridges that fall as much as the ones that hold steady. Happy bridge building.
For more fun activities like this, check out Emma’s Number Valley Quest, where she combines the LEGO DUPLO Number Train – Learn to Count and the Brick Box. Enjoy!
Written and created by Emma Worrollo, Play Culture Specialist & Family Creator
