How do My Family Builders figures help children explore diverse families?

My Family Builders magnetic wooden figures come in four skin tones with interchangeable heads, bodies, and legs, so children can build single-parent homes, blended families, two-mom or two-dad families, multigenerational households, and any other family they know or imagine. The 48-piece set includes both adult and child figures and supports thousands of mix-and-match combinations.

What makes My Family Builders different from other educational toys?

My Family Builders is the only magnetic wooden figure set designed around modular construction of human characters. Heads, bodies, and legs are interchangeable across four skin tones, so children build the people themselves rather than choosing from a fixed cast. This approach supports empathy through play, an approach grounded in social-emotional learning and recognized by the Parents' Choice Gold Award.

What ages are My Family Builders figures designed for?

My Family Builders figures are designed for ages 1 and up. The blocks are sized for small hands and the magnetic connection is firm enough for toddlers. The 16-piece Friends Set features children only and is the simplest starting point for the youngest users. The 32-piece and 48-piece sets include both adult and child figures and work well for preschool, kindergarten, and lower elementary classrooms.

Are My Family Builders figures safe for classroom use?

Yes. All My Family Builders figures are certified to ASTM, CPSIA, and EN71 safety standards. The magnets are fully enclosed in solid wood, the paint is non-toxic and water-based, and the pieces meet small-parts safety requirements for ages 1 and up.

How does My Family Builders support social-emotional learning?

The figures give children a hands-on way to explore family, friendship, and identity through play. Children build characters that reflect their own family and discover characters that look different from them. The 48-piece set includes 25 activity cards in English, French, and Spanish that guide conversations about empathy, belonging, and self-recognition during circle time or small-group activities.

What's included in the 48-piece classroom set?

The 48-piece classroom set contains wooden magnetic heads, torsos, and legs in four skin tones with both adult and child figures, plus 25 activity cards in English, French, and Spanish. The pieces support thousands of mix-and-match combinations and are designed for guided classroom activities, dramatic play centers, and structured social-emotional learning discussions.

Is My Family Builders used in real classrooms?

Yes. My Family Builders is used in Head Start classrooms, NAEYC-accredited early learning centers, and child care networks across the United States, including programs at Bright Horizons, Primrose, Goddard, and the YMCA. University early childhood education programs at the Erikson Institute, Penn State, and Northeastern have used the figures in classroom and research contexts.

How are magnetic wooden figures different from traditional dollhouse families?

Traditional dollhouse families come pre-grouped: one mother, one father, two children, usually one ethnicity. Magnetic wooden figures with interchangeable parts let children build any family they imagine: single-parent, two-mom or two-dad, blended, multiracial, or multigenerational. My Family Builders is designed around this flexibility, with four skin tones and modular construction in every set.

Family Diversity Set · Free Classroom Activity Guide

Free educator resource · Ages 3+ · Preschool and Pre-K

The Classroom Activity Guide for the My Family Builders 48-piece Family Diversity Set, multicultural magnetic wooden figures in four skin tones, gives teachers seven ready-to-lead activities about family, belonging and fairness, each aligned to a named goal from the Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework (HSELOF). The activities run on the set and the Activity Cards that come in the box, take 10 to 20 minutes each, and are written to be led straight from the page.

Download the guide (free PDF, 14 pages)

Written for teachers of ages 3 to 5+. Program staff, home educators, and families will find it just as useful. Works with the 48-piece magnetic wooden set with Activity Cards in English, French and Spanish.

What the guide covers

This is the set for family-composition work: children build their own families, families that look different, and the families the cards depict. The seven activities run in an escalating arc: a child's own family first, then the families on the cards, then feelings under competition, describing, perspective-taking, and finally what fair means when children disagree. The conversation is the activity; building is the hook. Across all seven activities, the outcome the set builds toward is empathy: seeing one's own family clearly, meeting families that look different, and talking about both comfortably.

The seven activities at a glance

#	Activity	Ages	Players	Materials	Time	Aligned primarily to
1	Look at My Family!	3+	1 or more	MFB blocks	10 to 15 min	P-SE 11
2	Mix and Match!	3+	1 or more	Red cards + blocks	10 to 15 min	P-PMP 2
3	Who's Missing?	3+	1 or more	Yellow cards + blocks	10 to 15 min	P-SE 11
4	1, 2, 3, Go!	4+	2	Red cards + blocks	10 to 20 min	P-SE 8
5	Guess Who?	5+	2	Red cards + blocks	10 to 20 min	P-LC 6
6	Tell Me About This Family	3+	1 child + facilitator	MFB blocks	10 to 15 min	P-SE 11
7	Same and Different	4+	2 to 6 + facilitator	MFB blocks	15 to 20 min	P-SE 5

HSELOF alignment: which goal each activity develops

The activities in this guide are aligned to the Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework: Ages Birth to Five, published by the Office of Head Start, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Each activity names the goal it most directly supports so the activities fit into the planning a program already does. The seven activities carry cited goals across four ELOF domain families: Social and Emotional Development; Approaches to Learning; Language and Communication; and Perceptual, Motor, and Physical Development.

Activity	Primary HSELOF goal	Also supports	What it develops
1. Look at My Family!	P-SE 11 · Child has sense of belonging to family, community, and other groups.	P-SE 9, P-LC 6	Children build their own family, then a different one. Building is belonging work; comparing is multi-group identity work.
2. Mix and Match!	P-PMP 2 · Child uses perceptual information to guide motions and interactions with objects and other people.	P-PMP 3	Visual-to-motor translation. Children replicate a card-depicted family with the matching pieces.
3. Who's Missing?	P-SE 11 · Child has sense of belonging to family, community, and other groups.	P-ATL 13, P-LC 5	Children imagine and build the missing family member. The choice is family-composition projection.
4. 1, 2, 3, Go!	P-SE 8 · Child manages emotions with increasing independence.	P-SE 4	A timed two-player build. Real frustration and real winning, with the educator scaffolding both.
5. Guess Who?	P-LC 6 · Child understands and uses a wide variety of words for a variety of purposes.	P-LC 3, P-SE 3	Yes-and-no questioning with descriptive vocabulary across hair, skin tone, family composition, and accessories.
6. Tell Me About This Family	P-SE 11 · Child has sense of belonging to family, community, and other groups.	P-SE 9, P-LC 5, P-LC 1	Each child describes a family they know but do not belong to, or one they invent. Perspective-taking through a family that is not their own.
7. Same and Different	P-SE 5 · Child uses basic problem-solving skills to resolve conflicts with other children.	P-SE 9, P-SE 7, P-LC 5	Children negotiate what fair means when a resource is scarce and difference is in the room.

HSELOF goals cited in this guide

Goal text quoted in full from the Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework: Ages Birth to Five, Preschooler sub-framework, headstart.gov. Accessed July 3, 2026.

P-SE 3 · Child engages in and maintains positive interactions and relationships with other children.
P-SE 4 · Child engages in cooperative play with other children.
P-SE 5 · Child uses basic problem-solving skills to resolve conflicts with other children.
P-SE 7 · Child expresses care and concern toward others.
P-SE 8 · Child manages emotions with increasing independence.
P-SE 9 · Child recognizes self as a unique individual having own abilities, characteristics, emotions, and interests.
P-SE 11 · Child has sense of belonging to family, community, and other groups.
P-ATL 13 · Child uses imagination in play and interactions with others.
P-LC 1 · Child attends to communication and language from others.
P-LC 3 · Child varies the amount of information provided to meet the demands of the situation.
P-LC 5 · Child expresses self in increasingly long, detailed, and sophisticated ways.
P-LC 6 · Child understands and uses a wide variety of words for a variety of purposes.
P-PMP 2 · Child uses perceptual information to guide motions and interactions with objects and other people.
P-PMP 3 · Child demonstrates increasing control, strength, and coordination of small muscles.

Recognition and alignment

Parents' Choice Gold Award. The oldest nonprofit children's product review program in the United States.
ECERS-3 · Item 26. Promoting Acceptance of Diversity. Four skin tones exceed the three-race minimum.
ITERS-3 · Item 23. Infant and toddler acceptance of diversity.
FCCERS-3 · Item 23. Family child care acceptance of diversity.
SACERS · Item 26. School-age care acceptance of diversity.
HSELOF aligned. Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework, Preschooler sub-framework.

Educator review edition. You are reading an educator review edition. We are sharing it before final publication, and the next edition will be shaped by what teachers tell us. If an activity could work better in your classroom, we want to hear it: hello@myfamilybuilders.com. A Spanish edition is planned; write to the same address to receive it when it ships.

Download the guide (free PDF)

Working with younger groups or children-only figures?

The 48-piece set is where family work lives. When your classroom is ready for friendship, feelings and fairness work with children-only figures, the 16-piece Friends set has its own guide: Classroom Activity Guide for the 16-piece Friends set. Every My Family Builders set works together.

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