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These Magnetic Tiles Keep Kids Occupied for Hours, and They're on Sale for Cyber Monday

Along with keeping your toddlers occupied, magnetic tiles help develop spatial awareness.

Katelyn Chedraoui Associate Writer
Katelyn is an associate writer with CNET covering apps, software and online services. She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in media and journalism. You can often find her with a paperback and an iced coffee during her time off.
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Katelyn Chedraoui
2 min read
castle built of multicolor tiles on purple background

With magnetic tiles, your imagination is the only limit to your fun.

 PicassoTiles/Amazon/CNET

I might be in my mid-20s with no children in my home, but I'm still thinking about buying these magnetic tiles from PicassoTiles, which are a great deal this Cyber Monday. I can explain.

While I don't have any kids of my own, there are young children in my family. The last time I went to visit, the toddler -- we'll call her Emily -- immediately ran into the living room, where these colored tiles were all over the floor.

At first I was reminded of the colored tiles and shapes we used to build figures in geometry during elementary and middle school. But these are a lot cooler. The tiles, each set containing a variety of shapes, sizes and colors, have magnets along each edge. This lets you stick the shapes together to create beautiful designs or build 3D towers. Emily's favorite way to play? Have me and her parents build towers for her to knock over (while she giggles the whole time).

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Each set also comes with a guide book, which illustrates all the different things you can build with the tiles, including but not limited to Olaf from Frozen, castles, roller coasters, flowers and more. Emily's parents and I spent some time trying to build a realistic-looking rocket ship, and it was a blast. The car trucks with wheels can help make your designs mobile.

Perhaps most impressive, and most importantly, these tiles engaged Emily's attention for quite a while. And, as a colleague pointed out, these tiles grow with the kids -- as children's spatial awareness and understanding of shapes and construction grows, the tiles will still be an appealing toy. 

I mean, I'm 23, and spatial intelligence isn't my strong suit, so maybe they're educational and fun for all of us who are kids at heart. I'll have a nice time messing around with them whether or not I've got Emily lurking, waiting, yearning to knock my creations down.

You can buy these PicassoTile sets on sale now at Amazon: the 100 piece set is $32 (you save $29) and the 60 piece set is $20 (you save $6). The set of two trucks is also discounted at $10.