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How to Sort Legos

There are 19 billion Lego building elements produced annually. Lego bricks are one of the most popular toys in the world. When it comes to how to keep them organized, there are two schools of thought. One of the ideas is to keep the sets together, in order to build the prescribed themes more easily, time and time again. The other idea is to have the Lego elements sorted by size and shape. Sorting by size and shape will lead to more creative play. Your child is not limited to building one way, they can use their imagination and build endlessly.

Things You'll Need

Clear plastic containers, varying sizes
Fisherman's tackle box

Instructions

- 1
  Spread a large sheet on the floor. Deposit your entire Lego collection on the sheet. Spread out the items on the sheet. Using the sheet helps if you don't complete your sorting task in one day. You can pick up all four corners of the sheet and put it away for the day.
- 2
  Locate the biggest items you have in your collection, most likely the building plates. Place them together in one of the clear containers. Continue sorting by size and shape, placing like items together in clear containers. Leave the lids off of the containers as you will unearth more of everything as you continue sorting.
- 3
  
  Specialty items should have a special place.
  
  Place the smaller items together in the fisherman's tackle box. Ending up with wheels, chains, cannonballs and other smaller pieces, the tackle box -- with its many compartments of different sizes -- proves useful. Save one tackle box for specialty items, like the key to the castle or the king's crown.
- 4
  Place all of the directions for your sets in one clear container. If you ever want to build the a specific set, you have the directions and can find the pieces you need from your containers. If you have lost the directions for a set, Lego's website has 3300 directions available in PDF format (see References).

Construction Toys