Tinder Box
Auckland, New Zealand
 

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A teachers interactive education resource available through costumed visits to schools (Outreach) and  Historical venues - within 150 kms of Auckland, New Zealand in support of the Social Studies and Technology curriculums, in particular Pioneer and Victorian past times. The curriculum linked hands on activity  takes approximately  40 minutes per session.
Explore the world of toys before electricity. Compare and contrast the toys of the past and the present. See some originals. Who made them? What type of materials are they made from? What makes them work? Play with reproduction  Victorian toys!  An interactive hands on activity which takes approximately  40 minutes.  Buy a spinning top!  To see an example from the Tinder box toy collection - visit the Toy of the month, or read what teachers and students say about the  programme  

New Supplimentary  Resource

Tinder Box now  offers  Craft in support of toys in which students make a toy.

 

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School visits: Toys before electricity

Curriculum links    Toy of the month

Boys with spinning tops and a girl with a climbing chimney sweep

Victorian Toys is an activity that meets the needs and abilities of all students studying the Social Studies and Technology  curriculum.   

Using a variety of reproduction toys, children are able to interpret  the past by playing with different toys.  A few original toys of the Victorian period will be displayed.

 Developments over time, construction, origins, names and the technology of toys are aspects covered during the interactive presentation.

A  Recent addition to the Tinder Box Toy  presentation is the Changing Pictures ©   component which presents a variety of scopes, tropes and devices showing the  Victorian fascination with pictorial manipulation  before the invention of the Cinema.  
 
By  the end of the activity children should be able to compare and contrast  the  toys  of  the past  and present , methods of manufacture    i.e.  home made and industrial, and have a clearer understanding of toys of Great Grandparents time.

 
The activity takes approximately 40 minutes.

Questions are encouraged at the end of the activity.

     

Climbing men were made possible by the combination two things: string and rubber bands. String and wood have traditionally been used in home-made toy construction. String was used for  Spinning tops,  Pantins, Chromotropes and other toys. The advent of rubber bands provided another source of movement for the Victorian toy maker. While gravity had once been a  power source for Jacob's ladders and marble races  the toy always descended. Imagine the joy and look of wonderment on a child’s face when the toy climbed upwards!

Climbing men are hard to come by, but Richard the Tinder Box toy maker crafts a variety of climbing men in various guises and these are used in the Tinder Box toy presentation to schools and played with by the students  providing pleasure and amusement.

In the  animated example a pirate with a canon on his back climbs the rigging. The picture of the left is an advertisement from a  Victorian  toy catalogue of the period

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Copyright RPL  13/6/2007

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Booking   Inquiry and Information Requests

Thank you for  your interest in the  Victorian toy activity, one of our most popular activities.
You may wish to  submit your inquiry through the form below, or contact us on the following phone numbers:  Phone +64 +64 (09) 412 8235, Mob 021 117 2068, 

Submit your inquiry here please...