NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — All the buzz about geek chic, tech start-ups and lucrative tech job prospects has given rise to a new toy category: STEM.

In an industry that’s seen little growth, playthings designed to boost kids’ brain power in science, technology, engineering, math have been one of the sector’s bright spots. (And some say that art is a crucial component, so there’s STEAM, too.)

“Parents have always asked about the value a toy has,” said Toys “R” Us Chief Merchandising Officer Richard Barry in an interview. “The difference is the words STEM and STEAM are very prominent on the customers’ minds. They are asking specific questions. We know that in the world we live in, tech, science and engineering are a big part of what’s driving the economy. There’s some significant news out there about the attractiveness of the job market in the science and engineering. As a parent, equipping your kids with the skills is important. That’s what’s driving (the trend.)”

Toys “R” Us saw strong sales in the category last year and will be dedicating more shelf space this year to it, Barry said. In fact, some toy makers have even changed their classic toy packaging to highlight out those STEM attributes that their toys have, he said. Toys “R” Us is also considering changing packaging on some of its own private-label Imaginarium and other educational toys, Barry said.

“STEM toys are continuing to grow because there’s obviously a market for them,” said Adrienne Appell, a trend specialist at the Toy Industry Association, a trade group representing the industry. “Kids are gravitating towards products that teach them how to build, code, learn about science because it’s such a mainstream part of our culture. If you can make a product even more engaging and use even more innovative technology, it makes it that much cooler.”

Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, -1.78% for the first time compiled a list of STEM toys this past holiday season, which turned out to be among its most-visited holiday toy lists by category, said Eva Lorenz, Amazon’s category leader for toys & games. Some of its best-selling holiday toys were STEM products, she said.

“We expect this trend to continue,” she said.

Check out some STEM toys:

Makey Makey

The product, invented by two MIT PhDs when they were still students, got its first break after getting almost $570,000 (their goal was $25,000) from more than 11,000 backers in a 2012 Kickstarter campaign. The product uses alligator clips, a circuit board and a USB cable that plugs into a computer and basically turns any object that can conduct at least a bit of electricity -- including banana, pineapple, plants and Play-Doh - to a keyboard or touch pad that can allow you to play things from piano music to Mario. “Sometimes what we know can get in the way of what could be,” Makey Makey co-inventor Jay Silver said at a Ted talk.

Amazon said Makey Makey are among those STEM toys whose sales tripled on its site last year. Toys “R” Us said it will carry Makey Makey later this year.

Andria Cheng / MarketWatch

Roominate

The founders behind the circuit-enabled construction and craft line targeting girls met in the master’s engineering program at Stanford and shared stories of why they became “two of the very few women” who became engineers, CEO and Co-Founder Alice Brooks said in an interview, adding she grew up playing with her brothers’ Lego bricks. The product was first funded in a 2012 Kickstarter campaign and began selling on Amazon in 2013. It’s now sold at major retailers including Toys “R” Us, Wal-Mart WMT, -1.02% and Barnes & Noble US:BKS. Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban became an investor after Brooks and her co-founder Bettina Chen appeared on “Shark Tank” last year. Brooks said Roominate’s sales quadrupled in 2014 from 2013. The business is “almost profitable,” she said. This year’s line includes a blue tooth circuitry that allows the toys to be remote controlled.

Lego Mindstorms EV3

Lego’s Mindstorms line, first introduced 17 years ago, is one of the classic examples of a STEM toy, industry watchers said. Lego Mindstorms EV3, the company’s third update of the product in 2013, allows users to program and command their robots with Lego’s programming software and mobile app. A teenager who used an EV3 kit to design a Braille printer has reportedly received venture-capital funding from Intel INTC, -0.85% , Lego said. Amazon said Lego Mindstorms line was also one of its best-selling products during the 2014 holiday season.

Vex Robotics

Since 2007, Vex Robotics has hosted the Vex Robotics Competition. Now 12,000 school teams compete. Its annual world championship, which will include 800 teams in April this year, counts NASA, defense contractor Northrop Grumman Corp. NOC, -0.68% and chip maker Texas Instruments Inc. TXN, -1.23% among sponsors. The company said its sponsors also use the competition to scour talent. The company recently introduced a consumer version of its kit and Toys “R” Us said it plans to carry them in stores this year.

GoldieBlox

The toy line, including books featuring a character named Goldie and construction kits that teach girls basic engineering and spatial skills, was founded by Debbie Sterling, who also received an engineering degree from Stanford University. The company also used a Kickstarter campaign to get its start. Its website has a pie chart showing that females make up only 14% of total worldwide number of engineers. “We aim to disrupt the pink aisle and inspire the future generation of female engineers,” GoldieBlox said on its website. “Today engineering really is a boys’ club, and I don’t fit in,” Sterling said at a Ted talk. “But I believe our little girls will.”

The Magic School Bus-Chemistry Lab

The product, featuring experiment cards and a chemistry kit, is the best selling item at The Young Scientists Club. The STEM trend has helped sales at the toy maker, in business since 1999, jump 50% last year, its biggest growth ever. It’s seen another 50% growth the first two months of this year from the year-earlier period, said founder Esther Novis, a mother of five and a Harvard graduate with a degree in biology. The company said on its website all of its products are designed by a team that includes Harvard graduates, scientists, educators and parents.

Meccanoid

Canada’s largest toy company Spin Master’s Meccanoid interactive construction robot targets kids 10 and up. It has a voice-recognition feature to respond to voices and can mimic movements. The company said the robot, which comes in two sizes, can say over a thousand phrases, dance, offer fun facts and can initiate conversations and remember birthdays. It also can respond to unlimited user-recorded voice commands and can be controlled through mobile devices. It also allows open-source programming, meaning any programming code that exists in the market can be used to design a robot. “It teaches kids how to interact through programming,” said Barry of Toys “R” Us. The toy retailer plans to feature this item prominently at its endcap, or what’s considered prime shelf space at the end of an aisle, when it introduces it in stores later this year.