I’m thrilled to show you some more great learning products from Educational Insights that once again make learning FUN! We were able to review their Hot Dots Jr. Phonics Fun set that includes Ace – The Talking, Teaching Dog as well as 80 interactive Phonics themed activity cards. This set is a great learning tool for teachers and parents! Additional Ace teaching pens can be purchased separately to allow more than one child to be using the set of activity cards at the same time.
My 5 year old really enjoys learning and so he was really into this set! The cards included lessons to reinforce learning the alphabet, letter sounds, long and short vowel sounds, blending of sounds, digraphs, and more in an interactive and fun game format! Each card features a lesson such as find which pictures begin with the sound made of s and n blended together. Then the pictures each have a black “hot dot” below it that the child can use the Ace talking pen on to see if they selected correctly or incorrectly. Incorrect answers gently encourage your child to try again without making them discourage! It was great to have my son review and practice lessons he’d already mastered as he learned how the Hot Dots system works. Then, he was ready to move on to recognizing the difference between long and short vowels and blended sounds and it was great to be able to work with him on those concepts in a fun and easy way!
Another fun toy that helps to encourage creativity is Playfoam! My 3 year old has LOVED playing with this playfoam and I seem to find the ball of the mushed together foam in his room just about every morning him having grabbed it to play with in bed! Since the playfoam doesn’t dry out I don’t have to worry or stress about it being left out of the package! Plus, it has really good about very little mess! Occasionally a few of the tiny foam balls will be separated “from the pack” and get lost but it hasn’t been a big deal so far. While it’s been a lot of fun for my boys to play with, I do think it’s hard to make many things that really represent a real life object. For example, the most creative I really got was a snowman and a hot dog – very simple shapes. It is hard to create really defined lines with the foam so the designs to stay pretty simple. This is really a non-issue for younger children though as they wouldn’t be attempting complex designs.
You can find these two products available on Educational Insights website or on Amazon. Hot Dots Jr. Phonics Fun retails for $39.99 and Playfoam 4-packs retails for $4.99.
Win It!
One A Mom’s Take readers will win
(1) Hot Dots Jr. Phonics Fun Set
(1) Playfoam Classic 4-pack
Ends 11/18/11 at 11:59 PM ET. Open to US/Canada.
*** GIVEAWAY CLOSED***
Disclosure: I received Hot Dots Jr. Phonics Fun and 2 Playfoam 4-packs for free in order to try the product and form an opinion for this review. I was not compensated in any other manner. The opinions expressed above are my own and any claims should be verified on the sponsor’s site.