Illustration originally captioned: Ritual burial objects from graves in the transitional period between the Bronze Age and the Iron Age. A toy rattle or baby's rattle is a rattle produced specifically for the amusement of an infant. Toy rattles have been used for this purpose since antiquity. Toy rattles help the child improve hand eye coordination by stimulating their senses. For centuries, rattles have been one of the first toys that babies play with. Rattles can be made of wood, plastic or cloth and typically make sounds when shaken. These sounds can range from the dull sounds typical of wooden rattles to the jingling or bell type sounds that metal rattles make.