buy or make Froebel Gifts

The Froebel Gallery offers secure online ordering of the original gifts and blocks.

The book Inventing Kindergarten has excellent photographs and descriptions of all the gifts. You can assemble many of them from materials which are readily available.

Building blocks are lots of fun and simple to make. The key is to make all of the different block sizes an even multiple of a common size. This makes them easy to use together. Ease all of the edges so that there are no sharp corners. Blocks small enough to fit in a young child's mouth could be a choking hazard.

Froebel Web is pleased to offer a selection of wooden building blocks based on the mathematical and geometric principles advocated by Friedrich Froebel for you to browse and buy online.

For details of makers of the original gifts and occupations around the world, send email to gallery@froebel.org

"Each gift should aid the child to make the external internal, the internal external, and to find the unity between the two."

1. ball on string
2. sphere, cube and cylinder
3. eight cubes
4. eight rectangular blocks
5. more cubes, some halved or quartered to introduce the triangle
6. more rectangular blocks, some halved lengthwise or breadthwise
7. parquetry tiles
8. lines
9. rings
10. points