We’re already fans of Boogie Board products, so we were excited to get our hands on their new Magic Sketch kit for kids. It’s an electronic art kit on which your kids can doodle, trace, learn, and more in rainbow colors with zero mess.
Kids these days have a ton of options to supplement their formal education; many more that I had when I was a child! But your options are limited if you’re trying to avoid handing your child a device with a screen. Enter the Matatalab Coding Set, a screen-free kit that helps your child develop cognitive abilities, imagination, and coding skills.
I spent some quality time at the 2020 New York Toy Fair; while it may be a bit smaller than CES, it is no less overwhelming. There was so much to see that it was almost impossible to settle on this year’s ‘Best of’, but we persevered and made our selections. Here’s a look at our picks.
Another CES has come and gone, and as we have in the past, we’ve sorted through hundreds upon hundreds of products to bring you the ones we thought were the most exciting, useful, disruptive, or clever. Take a look at our Best of CES 2020 award picks, and see what you think!
Right in time for Hour of Code Week 2019, Mattel is launching a new educational dimension to one of this year’s hottest holiday toy launches, Hot Wheels id. Hot Wheels id melds physical and digital play using NFC-enabled Hot Wheels cars to allow kids to test their cars in a virtual environment, including speed challenges and track building.
My son is 6, and his favorite subject in school is coding — mostly because he gets to play with little robots, but it’s still a very worthwhile and useful life skill. He also loves all things Star Wars, so when Kano offered us the chance to review their Star Wars The Force Coding Kit, we had to give it a shot!
Creating with plastic building blocks is fun, but building with Metomics Metal Designer Blocks looks like it will take creativity to the next level with gorgeous and long-lasting anodized aluminum designer blocks!
UBTech makes a huge variety of codable robots that teach kids all about STEM in a fun and exciting way. Their latest is the MeeBot 2.0, an exclusive with Apple Stores complete with LED lights and even dance moves!
Coding is becoming as integral a part of a kids education as math and reading. It teaches logic and helps kids better understand how the world of technology they’re surrounded by actually works. Also, Star Wars is objectively awesome and every kid wishes they had the Force. Kano is tapping into that with their Star Wars The Force Coding kit!
We checked out Jimu’s Builderbots last year and were impressed with these amazing construction and coding kits. UBTECH has even more exciting products out now, from a dragon to robotic champions!
Have you ever thought to yourself, “Self, this paper airplane is great, but it could use a motor and an app.”? Of course, you haven’t. But that’s exactly what you get with the PowerUp 3.0 Smartphone Controlled Paper Airplane Kit. I know, it sounds silly, but bear with me because there’s a lot to this.
Once again we explored the New York Toy Fair, going in search of some standout products. I walked over five miles trying to discover the toys worthy of our “Gear Diary’s Best of” moniker, and … I think I found them. There were many great items to see, but these are the seven that stood out to us.
Anki Cozmo is a friendly robot with a one-of-a-kind personality. Cozmo is playful, can perform tricks, sing songs, and explore his environment. He can even recognize your face! You can also take care of him like a pet when he needs to be “fed” and “tuned up.” My kids are obsessed with Cozmo and yours will be as well.
Teaching kids about coding has become as basic to education as reading and math. In fact, my kindergartener has coding as part of his school curriculum! UBTECH aims to bring coding and building skills to kids with their UBTECH JIMU Robot BuilderBots Series Overdrive Kit. It says ages 8+, but would my precocious kindergartener approve?
Learning the basics of coding is becoming as important as reading and math skills for young children. There are a number of ways for kids to learn, but the best is sneaking learning exercises into doing fun stuff, and speaking as the parent of a 5-year-old, it’s nearly universal that trucks and building things will attract children. Enter UBTech’s BuilderBots.
Art is not my strong suit. In fact, the last time I did anything remotely artistic prior to my son being born was when I took a mandatory art class my senior year of high school. However, I’ve learned to get creative with stick figure comics, and my game has stepped up dramatically with the 3Doodler I’ve been testing!
There is a seemingly endless list of things to teach your kids as they go through life, such as how to show kindness to others, why it’s necessary to have discipline while tackling boring tasks and of course, how to be responsible with money. People have had piggy banks for generations to help with the last necessity.
Summertime is just about here, and with it comes all the new gear from NERF. Recently, my crack team of testers and I checked out a couple of the new releases for 2018 to see if they are worthy of kids big and small.
We’ve spent the last couple of days scouring the aisles at the 2018 Toy Fair in NYC to find the coolest new toys. Whether you are looking for toys that will encourage your kids’ interest in STEM, get them more active, ignite their creativity, or help them imagine worlds far, far away, there is something for everyone.
Lenovo’s Star Wars: Jedi Challenges is arguably the most exciting use of augmented reality we’ve seen to date. To that effect, for anyone who has ever wanted to experience the feeling of what it’s like to wield a lightsaber (and that’s most of us) then this is the closest you’ll probably ever get to that experience. But sheesh – it turns out that wielding a lightsaber is a total workout! Who knew?
This weekend, I bought my son a toy that he has declared is “the greatest toy of all time, ever!” He spent hours with it, told everyone he saw about it, and pretty much played nonstop. It was educational, it sparked his imagination, and it cost me $1.50, because it was just an egg full of Silly Putty.