Froebel® Block Extensions — The Curvilinear Gifts

divided cylinder

Other block shapes were used in Froebel's original Kindergarten. While Froebel never specified them as a "spielgabe," his followers brought these materials with them to the USA. In the 1880's, Milton Bradley began producing the Curvilinear Gift and Divided Cylinder sets promoted by Minnie Glidden of the Pratt Institute.

The Curvilinear blocks allow for more thorough exploration of the connection between the sphere, cylinder and cube forms. By re-forming the Divided Cylinder blocks you can clearly see how they can form the spatial pattern of both the cylinder and the cube. The Divided Sphere blocks can form the clinder as well as the sphere (especially easy to see when the sphere is hinged).