Ball of Whacks: Six-Color: A Creativity Tool for Innovators, Artist, Engineers, Writers, Designers, and You [With 30 Pyramid Magnetic Building BlocksW

By Roger Von Oech

A creative tool for innovators like artists, engineers, writer, designers and you! Create inspiring shapes with the 30 magnetic Whack pieces. Working with your hands and eyes helps to stimulate brain... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Toy
• Language: English
• ISBN: B00A2QKZG6
• ISBN13: 9780911121056
• Release Date: April 2002
• Publisher: Creative Whack Company
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 3.6" x 3.8" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

A fun, creative toy for the person who has everything

This is just a fun, creative toy. It starts as a ball and comes apart into mini "pyramid-like" pieces. From here, you can use your imagination and create new objects (animals, stars, etc.). It also has a strangely soothing feel when you are putting it back together. The only drawback is that the magnets could be a little stronger. Sometimes it is hard to get your new creations to stay together because they slip. However, overall this is a really cool toy. Good for kids and adults.

Whacks Rhapsodic

Does this do everything it's advertised to do? Well, I can't prove to you if my left and right brains are communicating better, but I can tell you that the ball of whacks gives you an often much needed literal and figurative "timeout" so you can contemplate the big picture and the little details. From a sensory perspective, it's fun to manipulate the pieces and I like to leave myself signals (sharp points or rounded symmetry) of my mood on the table. Shapes change as do my moods; a good tool for developing EQ. The use of magnets/magnetism as part of the problem solving or creative exercise comes close to the "stacrobats" concept, but instead of soft figures and balls, you have all these wonderful points and pieces that reward the auditory and tactile sense with a satisfying "snick". Enjoy - have a ball!

OK, OK...

It hasn't made a single hair appear on my bald head, and it has not revealed the secret of life to me. All I can tell you is that it is amazingly fun, and the possibilities of what you can do are endless. I bought two, and my son stole one. The other is on my desk at work. It has attracted a lot of attention from colleagues, and several have ordered their own after just a few minutes of playing with mine. I'm a strong admirer of Roger von Oech's books and blog, so when I saw that he was associated with this "toy" I had no hesitation buying it. It is very well made, and the accompanying guide book is interesting and helpful. I highly recommend you get your own!

Geometric Hand Candy

I received my Ball of Whacks about a week ago and have trouble putting it (ok, them) down. Interacting and playing with it is extremely addictive and I have hooked my boss and another coworker by giving them each one. When I was younger I made crystal models out of marbles and geodesic domes out of cardboard and remember the excitement of uncovering different relationships between the shapes. The Ball of Whacks is bringing back that feeling of exploration and discovery and has quite a few patterns built into those 30 pieces. I forgot how much fun I had doing those explorations as a kid and can't figure out why I ever stopped. The Ball of Whacks includes the symmetries of all five platonic solids if you play with it long enough. I would suggest getting a couple of them - at least one for your desk and one for playing at home. You may need extras to share with family and colleagues and they are fun to combine into larger constructions as well. In creative problem solving sessions with coworkers I like to bring in various toys both to stimulate their playfulness and to change their environment a bit. I am looking forward to trying out the BoWs in my next session although I am a bit worried that I might not get them back readily. Awesomely fun and gets the brain juices flowing too!!!

An Epochal Innovation Breakthrough!

If you only employ one creativity-enhancing resource for the rest of your life, make that resource the Ball of Whacks! Breakthroughs in effective creativity-inspiring methods seldom occur. Most "new" methods are simply restatements or reshapings of ideas that flourished among the ancient Greeks (such as Heraclitus, a favorite source for Mr. von Oech) or before. Those who are familiar with the earlier work usually don't gain much from the newer approaches. The Ball of Whacks is a happy exception. Heraclitus would say that you can never interact with the Ball of Whacks twice in the same way. And he would be right. The most valuable creativity-enhancing methods I've experienced usually require having a team work together, with one of the tasks involving making little models or prototypes of creative concepts. I often find myself wishing I could have those experiences more often . . . but seldom having the right people and time to pursue that desire. Then, I discovered Roger von Oech's Ball of Whacks. Wow! My frustrations are now behind me. This is day 8 of working with the Ball of Whacks. It's been quite an education. I can hardly wait to find out what I'll learn on day 9! When you first see the Ball of Whacks, you won't quite know what to make of it. Open the box, take out the ball, the magnetic stand and the workbook. Then, let yourself go. Discover what the ball is. To the geometrically inclined, you'll notice that it's a rhombic triacontahedron (try saying that 5 times fast!), a ball-like shape with edges formed by 30 rhombi (a rhombus is a four-sided equilateral with two pairs of parallel sides) that resemble scaled-down versions of an Egyptian pyramid done in red. The ball feels somewhat alive, however. It gives when you squeeze it and resumes it shape when you stop squeezing it. As soon as you take out a piece, you'll discover that the ball is composed of 30 design blocks that use magnetism to adhere to one another. As you take the pieces apart, the ball disappears and many regular and irregular shapes occur. Usually, that's the end for me. I can never recover the original shape (my Rubik's cube is still a mess!), but the ball is easy to reform (if I can do it, you can too). I like abstract shapes and I was pleased to find that the magnets act both to attract and repel the pieces. Unlike Lego pieces, connections can be made in all kinds of odd ways. I also noticed that the pieces often reshape themselves, almost organically, as they choose a different connection than the one that I initiated. The casual results are often better than my planned ones. Based on a suggestion in the workbook, I began mixing in other objects that could be held by the design blocks. The results were infinitely more interesting and rewarding than anything I'd ever created before. I felt a great sense of peace from the experience. Many people had told me I would like sculpting, but I lacked the confidence to try. With the Ball of Wh