Creativity can be taught, and the toys kids get when their young can be a big help. Consider the 8-year-old boy who gets the small Lionel train set. Do they connect their thoughts about the train set with the real-life trains in the countryside or on road trips with parents? Do they see a train station, bridges, tunnels, and terrain that could be built around the train tracks? Do they have relatives or neighbors who may have worked on trains and could see the new Lionel train set layout and make comments and suggestions?

A gift can open doors to creativity but isn’t more required in mentoring a young child to think of options and get ideas? Is it such a big step from laying out a train station as a young person to understanding graphic design and layout?

Sometimes a lifelong passion for trains is sparked by the toy train set, and sometimes the trains seen in the world around us spark the interest in the toy train set.

Where is creativity best served? Assuming creativity is just a spark that lights itself are a mistake. Learning how to light that spark in others is part of what parents and friends can teach others as early as with their first toys. Finding out how to light a spark in yourself can be learned.