Why I Stopped Worrying About Those Wooden Blocks (and What I Do Instead)
The first time I saw the blocks, they were scattered across my kitchen floor—a set of wooden alphabet blocks my mother-in-law had pulled from the attic. My daughter, fourteen months old at the time, picked one up, examined the painted letter “A,” and put it straight into her mouth. It was a standard size, about an inch and a half square. Fine. But then she reached for a second block, one that had broken off from a train-shaped piece, and the round smokestack piece was maybe half an inch in diameter. Small. Chokably small.
I fished it out of her grip with my index finger and thumb, felt my stomach tighten, and asked the question every parent asks at some point: Are these blocks a choking hazard?
The short answer was yes. That smokestack piece absolutely was. But the longer answer—the one I’ve had to work through over the past several years, first as a worried mom and now as a preschool teacher—has less to do with the blocks themselves and more with how we think about risk, size, and the varying abilities of children who might use them.
I remember standing in that kitchen, holding the questionable piece, trying to remember the rule. Something about a toilet paper roll? No, that’s too big. Choke tubes are smaller. A piece that fits through a standard toilet paper tube is fine, but a piece that fits through a smaller tube—maybe the mouth of a water bottle—is not. I didn’t have a choke tube handy, but I had a straw from my takeout iced tea. The smokestack piece fit right over it. I put it on the counter, out of reach, and spent the next ten minutes sorting through the entire bin.
The blocks were a gift, which made the situation more awkward. I couldn’t just throw them away in front of my mother-in-law. But I also couldn’t let my daughter play with them unsupervised. So I did what many parents do: I hid the questionable pieces in a ziplock bag and shoved it to the back of a cabinet, intending to address it later. Later became weeks. The bag is probably still there, actually, if my husband hasn’t moved it during his reorganizing phases.
Here’s what I’ve learned since then, both as a parent and as someone who now spends her days with two-, three-, and four-year-olds in a classroom full of blocks.
The choking hazard question is rarely about the blocks themselves. It’s about the range of blocks in a given collection, and the range of children who might play with them. That attic set had large, solid cube blocks—completely safe for my daughter. It also had those decorative train pieces, which were not safe at all. And it had a few blocks that had slightly chipped edges, creating smaller fragments that could break off if she chewed on them. The issue wasn’t the concept of wooden blocks. The issue was that this particular set had been designed for older children, probably three and up, and it had been sitting in an attic for years, so some pieces were worn or damaged.
For children under three, the standard recommendation is that any toy or toy part should be large enough that it cannot fit entirely into a child’s mouth. This means roughly 1¼ inches in diameter at minimum, and even larger for younger babies. A piece that fits through a standard toilet paper roll is considered too small for children under three. But here’s the tricky part: that rule is a baseline, not a magic number. A block that is technically large enough can still become a hazard if it has a narrow handle, a detachable knob, or a shape that allows a child to bite off a piece.
In my classroom, we had a similar situation last fall. A parent donated a beautiful set of wooden building blocks, the kind with arches, ramps, and little wooden people. The arches and ramps were great. The little people were about an inch tall—borderline for a three-year-old, but definitely not safe for the two-year-old who was newly mobile and mouthing everything. We sorted them out. The wooden people went into a separate bin used only for the four-year-olds, and even then, only during supervised building projects.
The practical thing I’ve learned is that “choking hazard” isn’t a label you can just look up once and forget. It’s a question you keep asking every time a toy changes—when it breaks, when a piece becomes loose, when you suddenly have a child of a different age in your home. The blocks in my mother-in-law’s attic weren’t dangerous until my daughter found the small pieces. And those small pieces weren’t dangerous once I picked them up, but they would have been dangerous if I had just left the whole bin open and walked away.
So what do I actually do now?
First, I do the sort. I empty the bin or bag onto a rug, and I physically remove anything that fits through a choke tube (or a straw, if I’m being lazy). I also remove anything that has sharp edges, splinters, or broken-off pieces. This takes about ten minutes per toy bin, and I do it whenever I acquire a new set of blocks or whenever someone hands down a collection from an older child.
Second, I match the collection to the child. If we’re in the toddler room, I put out only the largest blocks. I keep the smaller, more complex sets for older kids, and I don’t mix them. This sounds obvious, but it’s easy to get lazy and just pour all the blocks into one giant container. That’s when problems happen.
Third, I watch the mouthing behavior. A two-year-old who is still exploring with their mouth should not be left alone with any blocks, even large ones. That’s not because the blocks are inherently dangerous—it’s because toddlers can find ways to make almost anything hazardous. I position myself nearby, and I follow the “hands-on” rule: if a child is mouthing blocks, I gently redirect them to a teether or a bigger block, and I stay close until they move on to another activity.
Fourth, I talk to other caregivers about the sorting process. My mother-in-law didn’t know about the choke tube rule. She just saw “wooden blocks” and thought they were safe. When I eventually explained it to her, she was relieved, not offended. She said she’d never even considered that the train pieces might be too small. That conversation is worth having with grandparents, babysitters, and even other parents in a playgroup. It’s not about criticizing their judgment. It’s just sharing information that’s genuinely useful.
I used to think that accessing the “choking hazard” issue was a one-time decision—you either had safe blocks or you didn’t. Now I know it’s an ongoing process of sorting, supervising, and re-evaluating. The blocks themselves haven’t changed. My relationship with them has.
The other day, my daughter—now nearly three—was playing with a set of cardboard blocks I’d bought at a garage sale. They’re huge, practically the size of small shoeboxes, and completely safe for her to chew on if she felt so inclined. She was building a fort, and my husband was sitting a few feet away, scrolling through his phone. The cardboard blocks were fine. But sitting next to the fort was a basket of small plastic connectors from an old building set, left over from a craft project. My husband didn’t notice them. I did. I walked over, picked up the basket, and moved it to a high shelf.
That’s not me being paranoid. That’s just me doing the same ten-minute sort I’ve done a hundred times now. It’s not perfect. There are always loose pieces somewhere, always a toy that’s probably fine but I’m not one hundred percent sure about. The attic blocks are still in a ziplock bag in the back of that cabinet, and I still haven’t decided what to do with them. Maybe I’ll sand the broken train piece down and turn it into a keychain. Maybe I’ll just throw the whole bag away the next time I do a deep clean. For now, they’re contained, which is what matters.
The question “Are these blocks a choking hazard?” doesn’t have a single yes-or-no answer. It depends on the block, the child, the moment, and who’s watching. For me, the answer is: not these ones, not right now, not under my supervision. And that’s enough.
Please indicate: Thinking In Educating » Why I Stopped Worrying About Those Wooden Blocks (and What I Do Instead)