The Only Gift Guide for a 5-Year-Old You’ll Ever Need

By age 5, children who have previously been obsessed with making mini-cupcakes and pizzas out of Play-Doh are skilled enough to make sculptures worth saving. Air-dry modeling clay is just as satisfying to squeeze and squish and will permanently harden after a few days. Tze Chun, founder ofUprise Art, recommended this 24-color set in our guide to thebest art supplies for kids; it includes cutting tools, extra plastic to keep unfinished projects from drying out, and an idea book for making specific shapes. The brand also sells 7-ounce packs of six differentsolid colorsin case your child needs enough blue for an entire ocean.

But that’s not to say there’s no place for Play-Doh in their lives, especially if it comes in a Barbie set that lets them create 3-D outfits for their dolls. Each of the sets in thisrecently released seriescomes with an 11-inch Barbie doll, a stand, a sheet of Play-Doh that looks like fabric, a clothing cutter, a fringe or ruffle roller tool, a stamper, and hair and hat molds. There are also additional pattern sets inhearts,bows, andgems.

According to Fjona Berisha, a sales associate at the NYC toy storeKidding Around, 5-year-olds and their parents both love these postcard-size Dover Little Activity Books, which have center pages full of stickers that kids can use to decorate the background scene printed on the inside cover. This one features an empty silver sundae dish they can fill with scoops of ice cream, fruit, gummy worms, sprinkles, and other toppings. There are also designs where they candecorate a pumpkinor fill apet storewith animals.

This dinosaur headlamp is featured in our guide to thebest outdoor toysand works both for camping trips and as a fun (and hands-free) way to explore your own backyard at night.

According to Kelly Harris Smith, founder of Boston-based art centerMinni, Ooly Chunkies tempera paint sticks are universal and great for every age but especially ideal for impatient kindergartners. “They dry quickly, are washable, and the artwork made from overlapping or blending colors is often surprisingly beautiful,” she says. They were alsorecommendedto us by Natalie Ebel, co-founder ofBackdrop, who tells us “they go on smooth and look almost like gouache.” The sticks are nontoxic and easy for little kids to hold. And for Halloween or everyday dress-up, Ooly has a similar set of body and face paint sticks called“Body Doodlers.”

Spot It!is a palm-size matching game that challenges kids to find the two identical images between two cards before other players do. And since it can be played by up to eight people at a time, it’s a great family game to keep in your bag for restaurants and doctor’s office waiting rooms. This one is animal-themed, but the game also comes in a bunch of different variations, includingcamping,numbers, and licensed editions likeDisney charactersandPaw Patrol.

Perler Beads are great for honing the already advanced fine motor control of a 5-year-old, while also allowing for open-ended artistic creation — the rainbow colors can be put in endless combinations onto pegboards in all kinds of shapes. Once in place, adults can help kids fuse the beads together with an iron.

Kids go wild for stomp rockets — a fact well acknowledged by both Sachs and Strategist contributor Steven John, who saw his own son take to them as early as age 2. At that age, he was more of a spectator than a rocket launcher, though; by age 5, kids have thebalanceand strength to send a rocket skyward on their own, something they will do repeatedly.

KiwiCo sells a wide range of individualcraft setsandSTEM kits, but it’s most well known for its monthlysubscription boxes, including one for the 3-to-6 age range. Each kit has hands-on maker and art projects that are perfectly suited to the rapidly developing mind of the kindergartner and early-elementary-school child. “This subscription fosters collaboration, problem-solving, and independence,” says Halley Loeb Rossler, a special-education teacher from Tulsa, Oklahoma. Rossler notes that in her own home, her boys look forward to the delivery of their boxes every month.

Each of the characters in this series of mix-and-match Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figures has removable arms, legs, and heads that you can swap for the body parts of others — Leonardo’s head on Donatello’s body, for example — to delightfully Frankensteinian effect.

Golinkoff likes how walkie-talkies encourage collaboration, communication, and creativity. AndDr. Alexandra Figueras-Daniel, an assistant research professor at the National Institute for Early Education Research, is a fan because they encourage turn-taking and are a really fun way to practice and develop language and communication skills. This high-quality pair has three different channels, allowing for multiple lines of communication and a range of nearly two miles, making them ideal for use all over the neighborhood or even during visits to the zoo or amusement park (the quiet-crisp audio quality is especially helpful in such noisy environments).

Maileg toys have a devoted following — and though they can be quite pricey, they are made to last. There is an entire mouse universe including dollhouses, vehicles, furniture, lots and lots of mice, and even apumpkin carriage on wheels.

Plus Plus — which have won all kinds of awards and develop engineering, design, and fine motor skills — are a favoritebuilding toyof Strategist contributor Youngna Park and her two children, who at ages 7 and 9 are on the older end of the toy’s age range but still love playing with them. Each piece is exactly the same shape, like two plus signs stuck together, but the creative possibilities are endless. My husband works at a private school in Brooklyn where his summer-camp students were using this set of Plus Plus pieces to make Beyblade dupes that actually spin. That’s probably too advanced of a project for a 5-year-old, but kids can use Plus Plus to build much simpler things, too, and age 5 is a good time to introduce them.

With this kit, kids can build a variety of wacky robots and then actually watch them move, explains Laurie Schacht, chief toy officer ofThe Toy Insider. A step-by-step storybook manual (reading is required) follows Ty and Karlie, two young engineers, as they help fix the robots at the robot factory. The manual makes everything manageable with minimal adult assistance required. After assembling the LEGO-like blocks, kids will connect their structure to a ready-made motor.

The original Gravitrax modular marble run is in our guide to thebest gifts for 7-year-olds, with a note that it’s a bit of a challenge for that age.Gravitrax Junior pieces are sized for smaller hands and designed for beginners. Berisha says these sets are really cool and fun for kids of mixed ages to work on together. Compared to the set designed for older kids, this one is easier to assemble and available in a few different themes: jungle, arctic, desert, and ocean. Each box comes with multiple possible track layouts as well as baseplates, marbles, a bridge, slopes, curves, a seesaw, cardboard animals, and 3-D themed decorative elements.

As kids get more confident in their gross motor skills, they also risk falling and hurting themselves on the monkey bars or other playground equipment. Thus, at any given time in elementary school, there usually are at least a couple children with an arm or a leg in a cast. When Calavan heard that herMilk Teeth co-founder Catherine Newell-Hanson’s then 5-year-old daughter had broken her arm, Calavan ordered a stuffy with a matching cast as a gift. “My son and I picked the animal, which body part to put the cast on, and the color of the cast,” says Calavan, adding that the gift was a huge hit. “She was so excited and we were sitting outside at a pizza restaurant when she opened it, and all the other diners lost their minds over how cute it was. Then she brought it into school the next day.”

Ebel recommends these colored pencils, which her 5-year-old loves because they are so “soft” and easy to draw with. “Nothing is more frustrating than a colored pencil that doesn’t really work,” Ebel says, “but these Prismacolor ones go on so smoothly,” making them a great gift for budding illustrators.

Swiss brand Caran D’Ache is also known for its high-quality art supplies. This kid-focused travel kit comes with a set of watercolor pencils, a set of watercolor pastels, a reservoir brush for mess-free painting on the go, travel-themed stickers, a carrying case, and a dozen postcards with line drawings you can color in.

“Dramatic play at this age can be more sophisticated,” says Figueras-Daniel, who adds that “having detailed accessories” — like those in this Playmobil animal hotel — adds to the play. The set has an outdoor pen and a bathtub for dogs on one side and a kitty lounge area on the other. There are also amenities for other pets like hamsters and birds — in other words, everything a 5-year-old might need to recreate a true-to-life scene. The attention to detail, and the vast array of other Playmobil sets you can use in concert with this one, makes it engaging for friends, parents, and caregivers too.

When selecting adollfor any child, Kristin Morency Goldman, senior adviser of strategic communications atThe Toy Association, says representation is key and helps children of all races understand and feel included in the world around them. Goldman recommends this 18-inch Zoe doll, whose textured hair can be washed and styled.

For 5-year-olds who are obsessed with tweens and teens, like my rising kindergartner niece, here’s an intricately designed classroom play set from Our Generation, a doll brand that’s mostly found at Target. The set features lockers outside the classroom door and a real working clock, fire alarm, school bell, and lights, plus accessories and school supplies. And while it’s built for Our Generation dolls, it’s compatible with other 18-inch dolls like Zoe, above, or American Girl Dolls.

One of the most essential toys for any kid is a scooter, and Carrie Wren ofTwo Wheeling Totsagrees with most of the parents and experts we havetalked tothat Micro Kickboard makes the best scooters on the market. “Their attention to detail, quality of design, and precision of build just can’t be beat,” she says. “No one really comes close, even though everyone tries to copy them.” The brand’s scooters are known for being lightweight and easy to use for toddlers all the way up to tweens. This one is designed for kids from roughly 5 to 12 years old andcan support up to 110 pounds. Plus the handlebars are adjustable so it can grow with your child. Note that this scooter also comes in aMini sizethat is rated for kids from 2 to 5, if your child is on the smaller side (and this wonderfullythorough guidefrom the brand can help you determine which size to choose).

A classic wooden-train set will keep most kids busy for hours and may ultimately hold a top spot in their toy rotation for years. ArtistAaron Luckmanand his wife, Birgit Wurster, who are parents to a rising first-grader, recommend splurging on a starter set from Brio and then adding less-expensive, compatible pieces fromIkeaandMelissa & Doug. This cargo railway set comes with a handy storage bin, a battery-powered engine, three cranes, a truck, a bridge, mountainous rocks, and a crossing signal.

“I absolutely, absolutely love a large play silk,” says Assa, recommending Sarah’s Silks as her top pick, despite their high price tag, because they are high-quality and will last for years. We included the brand’s mini-set in ourtoy guide for 1-year-olds, but as kids get bigger they will need bigger play scarves to use as capes, dresses, ocean or sky backdrops, blankets for dolls, or props for magic tricks. This set includes 17 primary- and pastel-colored scarves that each measure 17 by 35 inches.

If you’ve got a kid who never tires of fort-making, you might be ready for Super Space magnetic building panels. They’re basically life-size Magna-Tiles that kids can use to build playhouses, spaceships, and lots more. Strategist senior editor Jen Trolio has a set at home that she and her two daughters love playing with. Though they are great for a variety of ages, Trolio suggests 5 or 6 as a good starting point, because by then kids are a little bigger and more capable of building larger structures with them. They are also super-compact when stacked neatly, and thus very easy to store in a corner or under a couch.