The best gifts for four and five year olds this Christmas are the ones that put the child, not the device, at the centre of the play.
If you are looking for one clear answer before you reach for the wish list, here it is: at four and five, a child's brain is in a period of genuinely extraordinary growth, and the gifts that serve it best are ones that demand something of the child, namely imagination, physical effort, social negotiation, or patient thought. A wooden skittle set, a well-made puzzle, a beautifully crafted set of traditional games: these are not consolation prizes for the screen-free household. They are, by every serious measure of developmental science, the superior choice.
That is not a marketing claim. Researchers Hirsh-Pasek and Golinkoff, whose decades of work on playful learning are among the most cited in early childhood development, argue consistently that hands-on, open-ended play is the primary engine of cognitive and language growth in the early years. A gift that can be played a hundred different ways, picked up again after the tinsel has been cleared away, and eventually handed down to a younger sibling, is worth far more than one that demands only that a small finger taps a screen.
What the research says
Kathryn Hirsh-Pasek and Roberta Golinkoff identify four pillars of learning through play: it should be joyful, meaningful, actively engaging, and socially interactive. Screen-free toys and traditional games are uniquely well placed to satisfy all four at once.
Between their fourth and sixth birthdays, children are consolidating language at a remarkable rate, developing what psychologists call executive function (the ability to plan, focus, and regulate impulse), and beginning to understand that other people have minds, feelings, and perspectives quite different from their own. Vygotsky described this period as one in which play is not a distraction from learning but its leading edge. Piaget observed that children of this age are moving from purely symbolic thinking into more logical reasoning, and the best toys meet them precisely at that threshold.
Adele Diamond, whose research on executive function development is foundational in the field, has shown that games involving turn-taking, rule-following, and self-restraint build the very neural pathways that underpin academic readiness. A child who learns to wait their turn in a board game is practising the same cognitive skill they will need to sit still in a classroom, to listen before speaking, and to persist when a task is difficult. The gift, in other words, is not just the game. It is the habit of mind the game builds.
For the child who narrates elaborate worlds beneath the kitchen table, who assigns names and histories to every pebble in the garden, the ideal gift is one that provides beautiful raw material without dictating the story. Open-ended wooden toys are the gold standard here. A set of smooth, tactile wooden figures or stacking shapes becomes whatever the child needs them to be: characters in a quest, buildings in a city, passengers on an imaginary voyage.
Alison Gopnik, whose work on children as the research and development department of the human species has delighted parents and scientists alike, argues that imaginative play is not a lesser form of thinking but one of its most sophisticated expressions. When a four-year-old assigns a piece of wood the role of a dragon, they are engaging in counterfactual reasoning, the same cognitive operation that underlies scientific hypothesis and creative problem-solving in adults.
Browse Jaques London wooden toys, crafted for open-ended imaginative playJaques London, established in 1795 and the world's oldest games company, has long understood that the most enduring toys are those that grow with the child rather than dictating a single mode of use. The wooden toys in their collection carry that philosophy in every grain and curve.
For the child who likes to know how things work, who turns a present over in their hands before deciding how to approach it, puzzles and early strategy games are genuinely exciting gifts. Puzzles develop spatial reasoning, fine motor control, and the satisfying experience of persisting through difficulty to a successful conclusion. Jeffrey Trawick-Smith's TIMPANI study, one of the most rigorous examinations of toy quality in early childhood, found that puzzles consistently rank among the highest-value toys for learning precisely because they demand sustained cognitive engagement.
Simple strategy games, meanwhile, introduce children to the idea that their choices have consequences, that an opponent has a perspective worth considering, and that losing gracefully is itself a skill worth acquiring. At four and five, children can manage games with a handful of rules, and the research suggests that playing them regularly with an attentive adult is one of the most potent learning experiences available.
A note on adult involvement
Trawick-Smith's research, along with Vygotsky's work on the zone of proximal development, consistently shows that a toy's learning value multiplies when a caring adult plays alongside the child, asks curious questions, and resists the urge to solve the puzzle for them.
Some four and five year olds think most clearly when their bodies are in motion. For these children, the greatest gift is one that gets them outside, that asks something of their coordination and balance, and that involves the companionable chaos of playing with others. Traditional outdoor games, skittles, croquet sets sized for small hands, ring toss, and similar classics have served this purpose for generations, and with excellent reason.
Jaak Panksepp's research on the neuroscience of play identifies physical and active play as a primary emotional system in mammals, one that is essential not merely for fun but for the healthy development of social behaviour and emotional regulation. Sergio Pellis has extended this work to show that active play with peers is a critical training ground for reading social cues and negotiating conflict. A set of skittles in the garden is, therefore, considerably more than a skittles set.
Explore Jaques London traditional games, designed for children who play with their whole bodiesThe most useful question to ask before choosing a gift is not "what is popular this year?" but "how does this particular child actually spend a happy hour?" A child who gravitates towards solitary, focused activity will treasure a well-made puzzle or a beautiful set of wooden blocks. A child who is most alive in company needs games that bring people together: something to play at the kitchen table on Christmas afternoon, or to take outside when the cousins arrive. A physically restless child will benefit most from something that gets them moving and competing, without a screen in sight.
It is also worth noting that Maria Montessori's observations about the child's natural desire for order and mastery remain remarkably useful here. Children this age are not simply playing; they are practising. The gift that allows them to return repeatedly, to improve, and eventually to teach a younger child or a grandparent, is the one that will be remembered long after the wrapping paper has gone.
There is a particular pleasure in giving a gift that does not require a trip to the recycling bin by February. Toys made from quality materials, designed around principles of play that have held true across centuries, tend to outlast novelty items not merely in physical durability but in the affection children extend to them. A toy that can be played with differently at four, at six, and at eight grows with the child rather than becoming obsolete.
Jaques London has been making games and toys since 1795. The company invented croquet in 1851 and created the Staunton chess set in 1849, a design that remains the global standard for the game today. That lineage is not a curiosity: it is evidence that the company has always understood what makes play endure. The pieces are made to be handled, to be passed on, and to carry the memory of games played together.
On the value of the heirloom toy
Stuart Brown, whose work on play across the lifespan is essential reading for any thoughtful parent, argues that the objects associated with our most joyful early play become anchors for wellbeing well into adulthood. A beautifully made toy, given with love at Christmas, can carry that weight for a lifetime.
The toys that endure beyond the first day tend to share one quality: they respond to the child rather than performing for them. A toy that lights up and makes noise exhausts its repertoire quickly. A wooden toy or traditional game changes every time, because the child changes. Research by Dauch and colleagues found that children play more creatively and for longer periods when they have fewer, higher-quality toys rather than many cluttered options. If your child already has a lot, one excellent, open-ended addition is almost certainly more valuable than several more novelties.
Not at all, provided the game is well matched to the child's current level. Piaget observed that children of four are entirely capable of rule-based play, and Adele Diamond's research confirms that simple games with two or three rules are ideal for building executive function at this age. The key is to choose a game that offers a gentle challenge rather than frustration: something the child can succeed at with a little effort, and can then make slightly harder as their confidence grows. Playing with an adult who follows the child's lead rather than competing to win makes an enormous difference.
A traditional game is special precisely because it requires people to be in the same room, paying attention to one another. Grandparents and grandchildren playing skittles in the garden, or sitting together over a board game, are doing something no app can replicate: they are building a shared memory, and the grandchild is receiving the irreplaceable gift of an older person's full attention. Friedrich Froebel, the philosopher who gave us the idea of the kindergarten, understood that the most powerful learning happens in the space between a child and a caring adult who plays with genuine interest. A traditional game creates that space reliably, year after year.
The World Health Organization recommends no more than one hour of sedentary screen time per day for children aged three to four, and emphasises that less is better. The American Academy of Pediatrics echoes this, noting that the quality of what displaces screen time matters as much as the reduction itself. Researcher Jenny Radesky has shown that screen use during play can interrupt the parent-child interactions that are most valuable for language and social development. Choosing screen-free gifts will not undo every hour of television, but it does mean that the hours your child spends with their Christmas present are hours spent building something real: language, coordination, patience, or friendship. Over a childhood, those hours accumulate into something significant.
Britain's oldest toy maker. Every toy open-ended, wooden, and built for exactly the kind of play the research recommends.