I heard that the Idaho History Museum had an exhibition all about toys from around the world and decided to check it out this First Thursday. They had several interesting examples of toys and a few that you could play with. I was pleased to see that interactive element in the exhibition, but there seemed to be more text panels talking about the toys than actual toys on display.

The one display case that stood out to me was the case with cars. These cars had been built out of whatever material was around at the time. The one in the middle of the picture had an old shoe as a chassis. These cars reminded me of many of the inventions kids came up with while I was running Kids Invent. They were built with the creative problem solving and innovation we are desperate for students these days to learn, but this sort of activity rarely happens in classrooms.

I enjoyed the toys that were on display at IHM and was very pleased to see that they weren’t all in glass cases. I hope that the students who visit this exhibition are inspired to go home, pull out random “junk” and see what kinds of toys they can create.