Our first two tests at CCSC were generally considered a success - the toys were well enough loved by the kids that a couple of them cried when they had to go home because they wanted to stay and keep playing. Yesterday's test was no different.
First off, the kids enjoyed the big silicone dodecahedron. It was closer to a ball and had the right size and weight to be easily grasped. Playing with it outside was much like the first tests: throw, chase, hoard and not share. The coolest behavior was when the ball was used in conjunction with the slide - the kids found a way to roll it up and down and up and down, watching where it was going and trying to anticipate where it would end up. Otherwise, there wasn't much special about the dodec. It was basically a big ball.
OH! The best part of the dodec was that one of the dads, upon picking up his kid, wanted to see if it was like a lacrosse ball. So he launched it into the ground, only to watch it sail over the patio and onto the roof, where it still remains. We're now planning a rescue mission for later.
The omni-truck was a more interesting experiment. The kids, prompted by "let's play with this on the table" and nothing else, immediately turned it into a game. They gathered around the edge o the table and passed the truck back and forth, sometimes orienting it like a car and other times just pushing it back. After a little while, a group of three of them started taking the truck and the game to every other table they could find and trying it out there. It was pretty fun to watch.
