Block Castle

What you need

• a box of building blocks with flat, long and pointed pieces
• two or three small toys to live in the castle, each too big to fit through a toilet roll tube
• a blue scarf or cloth for the moat

How to do it

1. Tip the blocks out and sort them together: flat ones, long ones, square ones and pointed ones.
2. Ask what a castle needs, and let your child choose blocks for each part: flat ones for the floor, long ones for the walls, pointed ones for the tower roofs.
3. Build it together, naming the shapes as you go: a square for the door, a triangle on top.
4. Lay the scarf round it as a moat, move the small toys in, and play out who lives there.

Why it matters

A castle needs floors, walls and roofs, and each part wants a different shape, so the hunt through the pile for flat, long and pointed blocks is the game.

What they're learning

Naming the blocks

Square, triangle, rectangle: each block has a name and a place.

Choosing a block for a job

Flat for the floor, pointed for the roof.

Building a small world

A castle with a moat and someone living in it.

What to look for

Notice them hunting through the pile for one particular shape.

A tip

If a wall falls, that's a chance to build it wider at the bottom. A few toy figures or soft toys bring it to life.

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