Cuddle, Comfort, Create

Playing with Dolls and Plush Toys Expand Kids’ Emotional Literacy and Creativity

by Madeleine Buckley View Bio

Madeleine Buckley

Madeleine Buckley is an assistant editor at Adventure Publishing Group, where she writes toy reviews for The Toy Insider, a site that provides parents, grandparents, or any gift-giver with the most up-to-date insight on toys and children’s entertainment year-round. The Toy Insider also publishes an annual Holiday Gift Guide, which appears in Family Circle magazine. Buckley contributes to The Toy Book, the leading trade magazine serving the toy industry. This keeps her up to date on all the top toy trends and all things play!

Dolls and plush can play an important role in teaching children to express their emotions. Whether they are talking to their dolls or through them, kids can use these playthings as a valuable tool to communicate how they are thinking and feeling in a controlled setting. An especially loved stuffed animal can serve as a means of comfort or as a confidant during more difficult (or exciting!) times in life.

These toys are an excellent tool for role play, too. Kids can emulate the adults in their life as they “care for” their cuddly toys —whether that is pretending to be a parent or big sibling to a baby doll or acting as a dutiful pet owner to a stuffed animal. This can be great practice before the introduction of a real-life baby or pet into a child’s life, or simply a way kids can develop their emotional and communication skills for life.

I bet nearly every one of us remembers a childhood doll that held a place in our hearts, perhaps even a place of nearly mythical proportions. While modern dolls and plush toys can often move, walk, talk, or sing, dolls in their most basic form have been a staple of play since ancient times.

Another positive of plush toys is that they are an opportunity for classic play (aka screen-free time). This versatility allows for such diverse ways for kids to play, from utilizing them within a role-play scenario, to proudly arranging their collection for display, to creating entire worlds and scenarios for the toys to inhabit and act out. The great thing about all these play patterns is the imagination and creativity involved.

Here are some tips to promote and encourage these benefits as kids play with dolls and plush toys:

1. Express interest in the dolls/plush: Kids may be willing to discuss how their doll or plush is feeling, even when they may not be ready or able to discuss their own feelings. Recognizing the toy’s “feelings and thoughts” as legitimate is recognizing the child’s thoughts too. Discussing the personalities, likes, and dislikes of the dolls is also a way to encourage kids to expand their vocabulary.


2. Involve the dolls/plush in hands-on projects: Dolls and plush can be incorporated into other play patterns and activities, too. For example, consider using craft time to make something your child’s favorite baby doll can wear!


3. Use dolls/plush to encourage storytelling: Encourage kids to use their dolls and plush to create and narrate a story! This could be a telling just for you, a puppet-show style performance for the family or, for slightly older kids, a creative use of screen time to create home movies.

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