The LEGO Foundation - Build a World of Play (Rolling Grants)

The LEGO Foundation Build a World of Play Challenge is a major grant initiative from the LEGO Foundation that funds organizations promoting learning through play for children from birth to age six. Launched for the LEGO brand's 90th anniversary, the challenge distributed 900 million Danish Kroner (approximately $143 million USD) to support innovative early childhood development projects.

Funded projects use culturally relevant, sustainable approaches to improve wellbeing for young children, caregivers, and communities — including assistive technology access, positive parenting programs, refugee education, and Indigenous family support. Eligible applicants are nonprofits with scalable, evidence-based programs serving children in their earliest years, particularly in underserved and marginalized communities globally.

The Build A World Of Play Challenge Play unlocks essential skills Play boosts wellbeing for life Play is for everyone, everywhere The LEGO Foundation Governance, leadership, and policies Our courses Get in touch Join our team Build a World of Play Challenge For the LEGO ® brand’s 90th anniversary we’ve made a commitment to the world’s youngest children, giving out grants worth 900 million Danish Kroner to organisations that can help us give children the best start in life Standing out of 627 eligible applications, reviewed by 300+ expert reviewers, the 5 winner organisations promote the wellbeing of children, their caregivers and their communities, using culturally relevant and sustainable approaches.

With the award money they’ll continue to give substantial contributions to the lives of children from birth to six years old and spark a global movement to prioritise early childhood development.

Learn more about the winners Clinton Health Access Initiative Project name: Early Assistive Technology Access Location: Sierra Leone, Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, and Indonesia Millions of children with disabilities are barred from their right to play because they lack access to life-changing assistive technology such as wheelchairs or hearing aids.

Only a fraction of them get the products and services they need, largely through charitable donations. The Clinton Health Access Initiative aims to transform play for disabled children in eight countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. It will support governments to implement policies that integrate screening, early access to assistive technology, and play therapy into health facilities and schools.

Johns Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health Project name: Reclaiming Children’s Futures Indigenous people suffer the greatest inequities in the world – including the devastating loss of children to foster care.

The Family Spirit programme protects and strengthens parent-child relationships through culturally-grounded home education from pregnancy to age 5 and will be expanded in communities across the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The team aims to add to its impact with natured-based family play spaces to promote the power of playing together as well as reinforcing Indigenous family traditions.

Impact and Innovation Development Centre Project name: REAL Fathers Children struggle to thrive when they’re growing up in a violent home. Responsible, Engaged And Loving (REAL) Fathers is a government-endorsed positive parenting programme. Mentors coach parents in play and nonviolent discipline – which in turn helps children in Uganda grow up healthier and happier.

IIDC and its partners aim to adapt REAL across more local cultures, train more community-based mentors and help local government track the project’s impact. 11% of South Africa’s population is under the age of five. Children and their caregivers living in remote areas often miss out on early childhood development (ECD) initiatives.

So IRD Global and its partners aim to co-create playhouses in rural South Africa. They’ll focus on pre-school classes for young children, as well as day care and mental health services for caregivers and other community members. And they’ll train local women, particularly grandmothers (gogos), on ECD to extend reach into communities nearby.

Project name: Akili Family Location: Tanzania, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Uganda Africa’s youngest learners are missing out on early education. Caregivers lack the knowledge and resources to support them – believing play is disruptive, and learning starts at school. Ubongo creates and distributes locally relevant learning resources through TV, radio, digital and mobile to 31 million families across 23 countries in Africa.

It plans to scale the Akili Family programme to bring play-based resources to family’s homes. We need to invest in children from day one A child’s experiences in their first six years shape the life they’ll grow up to live. And, in turn, how healthy and wealthy their communities will be.

Yet around the world, governments barely invest in little ones’ learning and development. They’re not properly funding or prioritising early childhood policies. It’s a crisis - especially for children coping with pressures from conflict to climate change.

And it’s time we changed that. Learn how children develop Our challenge: build a world where children thrive Baby steps won’t do. For children to get the care, fresh air, safe homes, clean water, good education, opportunities to play, and nutritious food they deserve, we need bold, bright, big ideas.

With Lever for Change, we launched a 900 million DKK challenge (approx. 143 USD) to find and fund the innovative projects. And build a world where every child has the chance to learn and play.

Play centres. Holistic family support services. Positive parenting mentors.

Disability screening. Our top ten challenge finalists unlock opportunities for early learning for little ones and their families. Including in some of the world’s most marginalised communities.

Find out more about the finalists Project name: Empowering Rural Communities Location: Ghana and Uganda Lively Minds aims to put sustainable early development back into the hands of local communities.

Lively Minds and their partners work with government to train caregivers from deprived rural areas of Ghana and Uganda to run Play Schemes for pre-schoolers, using low-cost games and a structured curriculum to help little ones get a positive start in life - improving learning, well-being and hygiene levels.

Monthly workshops and weekly radio broadcasts also empower parents – especially marginalised, illiterate mothers – with simple, free ways to boost their children’s learning and development at home. Lively Minds, IFS and the Education Commission want to scale up the project in more hard-to-reach communities.

Project Name: Play and Language Through Visual Learning Location: United States and Thailand 95% of Deaf and hard of hearing children are born to hearing parents who struggle to communicate with their child because they don’t know sign language and aren’t aware of their child’s visual communication needs.

When deaf children miss out on crucial language acquisition in their early years of life it has a lifelong impact on their academic, social and physical health. Motion Light Lab and the SKI-HI Institute are partnering to end language deprivation by mentoring parents and providing play-based resources and support to help families develop healthy communication with their children.

Project name: Community-Led Learning Through Play for Refugee Children Location: Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Malawi, and Malaysia Refugee children face a challenging start to life – exposed to loss and trauma early on. Nearly a third never enrol at primary school. Cohere partners with refugee-led organisations (RLOs), supporting them with tools to bring early education to communities – such as installing software on locally-made tablets.

They’ve also built a platform for RLOs to share their work. They plan to develop a text-message course for caregivers supporting children’s social and emotional skills. Project name: Care to Play Nearly 90% of Indian children are born into families that struggle with poverty.

So time to play and learn with little ones is minimal – just 30 minutes a day at most. Care to Play is a partnership between Indus Action, Saajha, Trickle Up, Rocket Learning and IDinsight. By working with parent engagement groups, supporting access to welfare rights and building on government pre-school systems, it aims to bring early childhood education – and a pathway out of poverty – to five million vulnerable children.

Clinton Health Access Initiative Project name: Early Assistive Technology Access Location: Sierra Leone, Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, and Indonesia Millions of children with disabilities are barred from their right to play because they lack access to life-changing assistive technology such as wheelchairs or hearing aids. Only a fraction of them get the products and services they need, largely through charitable donations.

The Clinton Health Access Initiative aims to transform play for disabled children in eight countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. It will support governments to implement policies that integrate screening, early access to assistive technology, and play therapy into health facilities and schools.

Project name: Akili Family Location: Tanzania, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Uganda Africa’s youngest learners are missing out on early education. Caregivers lack the knowledge and resources to support them – believing play is disruptive, and learning starts at school. Ubongo creates and distributes locally relevant learning resources through TV, radio, digital and mobile to 31 million families across 23 countries in Africa.

It plans to scale the Akili Family programme to bring play-based resources to family’s homes. Impact and Innovation Development Centre Project name: REAL Fathers Children struggle to thrive when they’re growing up in a violent home. Responsible, Engaged And Loving (REAL) Fathers is a government-endorsed positive parenting programme.

Mentors coach parents in play and nonviolent discipline – which in turn helps children in Uganda grow up healthier and happier. IIDC and its partners aim to adapt REAL across more local cultures, train more community-based mentors and help local government track the project’s impact. Project name: Leverage Box: Game 4 All Turkey is host to the world’s largest refugee population.

But refugee children aged 0-6 with special needs have little access to education services, since compulsory formal education doesn’t include early childhood education or the pre-school system’. Leverage Box: Game 4 All aims to bridge the gap with wellbeing and development centres for children aged 2-6 focusing on play therapy.

They’ll base them in Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Gaziantep, Adana and Mersin, near the communities that need them most. Johns Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health Project name: Reclaiming Children’s Futures Indigenous people suffer the greatest inequities in the world – including the devastating loss of children to foster care.

The Family Spirit programme protects and strengthens parent-child relationships through culturally-grounded home education from pregnancy to age 5 and will be expanded in communities across the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The team aims to add to its impact with natured-based family play spaces to promote the power of playing together as well as reinforcing Indigenous family traditions.

11% of South Africa’s population is under the age of five. Children and their caregivers living in remote areas often miss out on early childhood development (ECD) initiatives. So IRD Global and its partners aim to co-create playhouses in rural South Africa.

They’ll focus on pre-school classes for young children, as well as day care and mental health services for caregivers and other community members. And they’ll train local women, particularly grandmothers (gogos), on ECD to extend reach into communities nearby. More donors are always welcome You can help us make a greater impact, raise awareness and support bold ideas that can transform futures for the world’s youngest children.

If you’re interested in giving extra funding for the Build World of Play Challenge, contact Dana Rice , Vice President of Philanthropy at Lever for Change. Please direct your media inquiries to [email protected] LEGO, the LEGO logo and LEGO DUPLO are trademarks of the LEGO Group. ©2026 The LEGO Group