How Jigsaw Puzzles Help Kids Learn to Solve Problems

We’ve always loved jigsaw puzzles here at Squoodles. As well as providing hours of entertainment and enjoyment, they can also help grow a child’s problem-solving and other developmental skills. You could say that they provide the perfect brain food for our kids.

In our article How to Pick a Wooden Puzzle for Your Child, we share some tips on selecting the right puzzle: take a read if you are hunting for some jigsaw puzzles for your little one.  Today though, we’re going to explain how problem-solving skills are developed by playing with puzzles.

What Problem Solving Skills Do Jigsaw Puzzles Teach Kids?

If you think about it, solving a puzzle can be like a box of chocolates: you never know which one goes where until you find the right spot. Okay, so I kind of muddled that quote from Forest Gump, but there’s a ring of truth in it. Jigsaw puzzles are designed to make you think about:

• What you are doing
• What the final result will look like
• Can you do something different to achieve your goal

It’s problem-solving in a nutshell: what do I need to do to solve this problem (or finish this puzzle)?

Specifically, puzzles help our kids to develop their:

• Critical thinking – I see a puzzle piece as one shape, but the space where it goes is another shape. That means it doesn’t fit there, so I should look somewhere else.
• Visual perceptual – I use my eyes to see if a shape and the colour would look right in one place. If it doesn’t, then I can try moving the shape around until it does fit.
• Memory – I remember that a piece with flat sides goes on the edge, and that two pieces which look the same don’t fit together.
• Ingenuity – if it doesn’t fit, then I could try a different way and think outside of the box to build the puzzle.

Besides problem-solving skills, a jigsaw puzzle can also help develop a child’s:

• Fine motor skills
• Hand-eye coordination
• Concentration and confidence by increasing the production of dopamine
• Level of patience
• Connections between left and right brains
• Understanding of fractions, that each piece is only a fraction of the big picture
• Teamwork and cooperation skills

Here at Squoodles, we have one of New Zealand’s largest collection of wooden educational puzzles. With puzzles suitable for toddlers through to school-aged children, there’s something for everyone: so come and take a look.