edHelper.com
Inventors and Inventions

Inventors of Toys

Inventors of Toys
Reading Level
     edHelper's suggested reading level:   grades 6 to 8
     Flesch-Kincaid grade level:   6.52

Vocabulary
     challenging words:    cofounders, non-toxic, standing, editorial, lopsided, craie, ending, encounter, archaeological, yo-yos, glitter, historical, bands, construction, frisbees, material
     content words:    United States, Donald Duncan, President Teddy Roosevelt, President Roosevelt, Edwin Binney, Harold C., Barbie Dolls, Elliot Handler, Mattel Company, George Parker

Print Inventors of Toys
edHelper.com subscriber options:
     Print Inventors of Toys  (font options, pick words for additional puzzles, and more)
     Quickly print reading comprehension
     Print a proofreading activity

Feedback on Inventors of Toys
     Leave your feedback on Inventors of Toys  (use this link if you found an error in the story)

Inventors of Toys
By Sharon Fabian 		  
1     Millions, maybe billions, of people have invented toys. Most of these people are kids. Kids invent toys from building sets and from other toys. Kids invent toys from pots and pans. Kids invent toys from old clothes and broken tools. Kids even invent toys from sticks and stones, string and rubber bands, construction paper and glitter glue. Round, square, flat, and lopsided objects are all good for making toys. Any material will do -- plastic, wood, paper, Styrofoam, fuzzy fabric, or nutshells.
 
2     Sometimes adults invent toys too, but, in many cases, they don't actually invent the toy but take a toy that has been invented somewhere before and make it popular. Take, for example, the yo-yo. Yo-yos have been around for thousands of years. We know because yo-yos have been found along with other historical artifacts at archaeological digs. This is how we know that stone yo-yos were used back in ancient Greece. In the 1800's they became very popular as a children's toy, first in England and then in the United States. Then people got tired of them for a while until, in 1928, Donald Duncan went into the yo-yo business. He hired "Yo-yo men" to go door to door demonstrating and selling yo-yos. Today the name Duncan still goes with yo-yo.
 
3     Teddy bears were named after a president of the United States, although he didn't invent them. President Teddy Roosevelt was a hunter, and on one of his hunting trips he had an encounter with a bear. That led to editorial cartoons showing pictures of President Roosevelt and a cute little bear. Somehow that led to cute, fuzzy, sewed bears for little kids to play with.

Paragraphs 4 to 8:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable
Copyright © 2008 edHelper