Best Educational Toys & Games for Infants & Toddlers

Whoever said learning can't be fun? Check out these super cool toys that your infant and toddler will love and will keep them engaged and learning. All of these toys can enhance your little one's motor skills, reasoning skills, social skills, and much much more. It's never too early to learn, so get playing!

Help your toddler exercise his or her fine motor skills with Spike the fine motor hedgehog by Learning Resources. The toy comes with 12 peg-shaped "quills" that are easy for little hands to hold and that can help youngsters work their fine motor skills, such as grasping and object manipulation. Kids can also work on their hand-eye coordination as they place the quills into holes in Spike's back. The multicolor quills can also help tots learn to count and recognize different colors. And when it's time to clean up, Spike's quills fit neatly into the toy's body. (Recommended ages: 18 months and up.)

Give your child an up-close view of bugs, leaves, flowers, and other natural objects with GeoSafari Jr. Bugnoculars by Educational Insights. The eyepieces allow for 3x magnification of whatever critters you catch, and the watertight collection container allows you to zoom in on water-dwelling creatures such as tadpoles. But don't worry — the container comes with air holes to keep oxygen-breathing creatures safe until release. Perfect for the budding entomologist or ecologist in your life. (Recommended ages: 36 months to 6 years.)

When your baby is ready to stand, so is this toy. The VTech Sit-to-Stand learning walker comes with a detachable activity panel that allows little tikes to play on the floor but that attaches to the walker when the kiddos are ready to stand up and go. The panel features a myriad of playthings, from piano keys and shape sorters to light-up buttons and spinning rollers. These offer not only fun, but also a chance to learn and develop motor skills. (Recommended ages: 9 months to 3 years.)

Help your youngster learn elementary engineering concepts with this first automobile engineer kit by Thames & Kosmos. With this 70-piece kit, kids can build 10 model vehicles featured in the included storybook or make their own auto creations, all while honing their fine-motor, visuospatial, and reasoning skills. (Recommended ages: 3 years and up.)

Building blocks are the best. They bring out your kid's inner engineer; help teach memory skills, spatial relationships, and object permanence; and most importantly, are too big to swallow. Uncle Goose's handcrafted wooden building blocks (made from "sustainable Michigan basswood," we are told) give you all of that goodness plus the satisfaction of teaching junior about nature's wonders, beautifully rendered in lovely, nontoxic ink. We're partial to these ocean-themed blocks because, as any nerd knows, ocean animals are the coolest animals. But if the sea doesn't float your boat, consider another Uncle Goose block set, like one for bugs, birds, flowers, constellations or dinosaurs. (Recommended ages: 2 and up.)

Times have changed. These days, if your kid isn't developing apps by 6 months old, you can kiss your first-choice kindergarten goodbye. Give your future Nobel laureate a head start with Code-a-Pillar, the electronic toy caterpillar that gives junior her very first programming lesson. Each of Code-a-Pillar's eight segments relays a different command (move straight, turn or play music), and it's up to junior to decide which order they happen in. Fisher Price promises "endless combinations" of caterpillar actions, but actually, it's closer to about 40,000. So, you know, don't be surprised if your kid exhausts this toy's potential by the time they're in college. (Recommended ages: 3 to 6 years old.)