"Poti Baba" - the Magic Man, India's Arvind Gupta

Arvind Gupta, the winner of India's first National Award for Science Popularisation, has taught hands on science and toy-making workshops to thousands of children throughout India. His trash-to-treasure lessons have been written up in numerous books, freely available for download.

"Twenty-five years ago, I discovered that if children see a scientific principle incorporated into a toy, they understand it better." - Arvind Gupta

At BRINQ, we've long been fans of magic man and toy tinker Arvind Gupta and his Little Toys, so we think it's high time we do our part in sharing his work with the world!

The range of his toys is unlimited. Like a magician, he puts his hand into his magical bag and pulls out all kinds of wonderful science-based toys. Mechano sets made out of cycle tubes, motor cars made from batteries and magnets, air pumps to blow balloons from empty film roll cans and cycle tubes, fun toys like a marble-swallowing rat made from newspaper, different games from matchsticks and boxes, and many many more. What gets the children totally hooked is the fact that all these marvellous little gizmos can be created by them too.

Keeping simplicity and affordability as his guiding principles, Gupta's toys are made out of household waste. Discarded tetrapaks, cycle tubes, toothpaste tubes, paper, battery cells, refills, film rolls, cartons, bottles, straws… there's nothing that doesn't qualify as raw material in his laboratory. To make his toys, one doesn't need to shop for expensive and new things; any used item can be recycled into a wonder toy of science. "After all, in a world so full of junk, there can be no dearth of material," he points out. "Half the fun is in collecting the material," he adds and children ought to be trained to look at waste as the birthplace of new creations. [Read more from "Toying with science"]

Gupta, the winner of India's first National Award for Science Popularisation, has taught hands on science and toy-making workshops to thousands of children throughout India. His trash-to-treasure lessons have been written up in numerous books, freely available for download. "Little Toys" is one of his most well known books:

An attempt has been made in the book to show how some of this modern junk can be recycled into joyous toys. Film-roll cases can be transformed into a high-efficiency pump, Frooti tetrapacks into measuring cylinders or butterflies, packets of cigarette into merry-go-rounds. These new raw materials offer innumerable possibilities for use in low-cost science experiments and in making dynamic toys.

Try making some of his toys yourself, and enjoy these treasures from India's Magic Man!

Additional Links and Resources:

• An interview with Arvind Gupta - by Multiworld.org
• Books from Arvind Gupta - more science and toy-making books for download
• Little Toys Excerpt - a color excerpt on the web of six toys from the book
• Gupta books for purchase - physical copies of three of Gupta's books, including "Little Toys"

Past "Toys from the Brinq" articles:

The Power of Play -- A Playful Exchange -- Invention at Play -- Finding Blue in a Sea of Gray -- Brazilian Toys Libraries -- Geppetto's Dilemma -- Playing on Empty