“Exercising Good Relationships” has received Dr. Toy’s Best Children’s Vacation Products Award for 2010!

Dr. Toy’s Best Vacation Products Awards were developed by noted child development authority, Stevanne Auerbach, Ph.D. (a.k.a. Dr. Toy), as a service to consumers who desire to purchase safe, affordable, educationally-oriented, and stimulating toys and play products for children for vacation time at home or on the road.

“As a childhood specialist for 40 years,” says Dr. Toy, “I have seen the continuous, essential need for more year-round resources for consumers to identify and choose the most appropriate products for all children.”

Dr. Toy’s Evaluation:

One To Grow On! Exercising Good Relationship Skills

"These audio stories are dramatized and filled with music and sound effects. Each two-CD collection contains four stories, approximately 18 to 25 minutes in length. They make excellent travel and bedtime companions, providing hours of entertainment children want to hear over and over. Parents, too, appreciate the content. One of four collections in the series, The Green Collection focuses on relationships. Parent’s will find these stories a great starter for some laughter and good discussions. The family can enjoy traveling together as they listen and talk about the stories they are hearing. Time passes quickly and the sharing results in better understanding of each other. At bedtime the stories are a nice way to relax and rest."

Dr. Toy’s Best Children’s Vacation Products are carefully chosen, using extensive criteria she has developed over many years, from among hundreds she has reviewed at toy fairs, in catalogs, and through many other sources.  The criteria she uses includes: safety, age-appropriateness, design, durability, lasting play value, cultural and ethnic diversity, good transition from home to school, educational value, learning skills, creativity, improvement in the understanding of the community and the world, good value for price, and, naturally, fun.

She adds, “The Best Vacation Products a balanced selection from large and small, new and established, companies across the U.S.A., Canada, and overseas will provide children with exciting new learning tools that will help them not only do better in school, but also will provide more constructive activities while traveling or at vacation destinations.”  

Dr. Toy believes “parents need more help to get a head start locating new, diversified products that children will enjoy as they increase learning skills and expand creativity. “Children learn best through play,” says Dr. Auerbach, “and these Best Products encourage children to maximize their potential and make the most of Smart Play. By making a renewed focus on summertime as a special time for choosing new products for children, parents improve their children’s development. This is a perfect time for parents to ‘take stock’ and do an inventory of what their children are playing with, what is not used, and what they need next in their development.”