The more you learn about the world, the richer and more meaningful and engaging your play becomes. There is so much you can learn about pigs.
Contrary to stereotypes, pigs are clean and smart animals who love playing and exploring. If you want to be a good farmer, you need to provide them with a lot of space to run (they can run very fast) and a pond to bathe and even swim in (they prefer water to mud to keep themselves cool). Just like children, piglets need toys and a rich environment.
Pigs do not eat like pigs. They like eating slowly and savouring their food, Then they love “talking” to one another. They can easily be trained, so some people keep them as pets.
There are many stories about pigs. Our favourite is “Babe” – about the pig who wanted to work as a sheepdog, the lovely character from Dick King-Smith’s novel “The Sheep-Pig”, which has also been filmed. Which is yours?
Our wooden toy piglet is a realistic yet artistic figurine made of sturdy beech wood, colored with water-based paint which lets the wood pattern be seen. It is a natural match to our adult pig figurine, and it could also be a companion to many other toys we offer in our farm animal collection. We even have a border collie dog, in case your children want to include scenarios from “Babe” in their play.
Play could be immensely enriched through reading fictional stories as well as scientific books. In turn, knowledge of the world could be consolidated, and speech, problem solving and many other skills could be honed through play.
What we believe is the most important about play though is that it is enjoyable in its own right, and it is what children should be engaged with – this is their main “job”. They do not need electronic toys to save themselves from boredom as they have the natural capacity to create their own meaningful activities. Sometimes some children might need help to get started, but this does not mean that parents should play with their children all the time. Follow our blog to learn more about play, one of the topics we explore deep and wide.