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Orchard Toys Fruit Frenzy Card Game
by emmad5689
==Purchase==
When my eldest daughter Sophie was in reception class they brought home what they called Chatter Matters bags each week and through these we became aware of Orchard games and thoroughly enjoyed playing them. When I was looking for presents fro Christmas I searched for Orchard Games on Amazon and was amazed ... just how many different ones there are. I liked the look and description of this one so bought Sophie it as one of her presents, the game currently costs £7.50 and comes with free delivery.
==Packaging==
The games comes packaged in a very brightly coloured cardboard box which was one of theings that drew me to the game when searching online. The box is about A5 size which is great as I find a lot of games come in boxes way bigger than what is necessary which just means they take up more room on the shelves.
The box has a bright yellow background and has some friendly looking fruit on the front of it, there is a raspberry, a pear, a strawberry, a banana, an orange, an apple and a pineapple of of which have smiley faces on them. The box states that the game is for 2-4 players and for ages 4 and up which I think is a decent guide for age. On the back of the box you have an educational guide which states that the game will help,
Improve observation skills
Develop social communication
Promote healthy eating
Link with early years learning goals
Link with National Curriculum Science and PSHE Key stage 1
==In the Box==
Inside the box you get a fruit spinner, 42 fruit cards, 2 wild cards and a set of instructions, the instructions are simple to follow and are printed in a number of different languages making the game uiversal.
The spinner is a piece of board which shows a friendly banana and a friendly pear holding a circle with a plastic spinning arrow in the middle, the circle is split into 3 options and shows a set of hands picking up fruit cards which are face up so you can see what the pictures are, 1 hand picking up cards where the picture cannot be seen and then the smallest section shows a number of hands all grabbing at cards that you cannot see the picture on. The spinner is very easy to spin and a simple push with your finger however if you do either have it on a hard flat surface or push on the spinner from underneath the board then the spinner doesn't move very far as it rubs against the board.
The fruit cards are all on hard white board and the backs are all coloured blue with the words Orchard Toys written over and over again in white. You get 6 cards each of the 7 different fruits, the fruits are all very brightly coloured and all look very friendly with great big smiles and waving or giving your child the thumbs up sign. The 2 wild cards show pictures of all 7 fruits and can be used as any fruit when you are playing the game.
The game pieces are all very good quality, they pieces are not at all flimsy and they don't bend at all so are not very easy to damage, the spinner really should be held in place underneath to make it spin better but that is the only problem with the pieces.
==Playing the Game==
The aim of the game is to collect 5 of the same card the one who does so first is the winner, to play the game you need to lay all the cards face down on a table, obviously if you have just played a game then you need to mix the cards around so that they are not all grouped together and it certainly isn't easy to shuffle the cards as you cannot manage to hold them all in one pile. Each person playing has to pick 5 cards out of the pool on the table and this becomes their hand, once everyone has their hands the youngest player is the first to spin the spinner. Sophie struggles to spin the spinner herself and I have to hold it for her and push the spinner from underneath for it to work for her, she doesn;t seem to be able to hold the spinner up herself as her hands aren't big enough.
Depending on which section the spinner lands on depends on what you have to do, if the spinner lands on the hand picking up a blue card then the player has to pick up a card from the table which is face down, if the player does not need the card then they place it back onto the table but this time place it face up, if they do need the card then they add it to their hand and remove a card they don't need from their hand and place that face up on the table. If the spinner lands on the picture of a hand picking up a fruit card then the player can choose any of the face up cards on the table to swap with a card in their hand, if it is the first go and there are no cards face up then they just pick up a face down card instead. The final section of the spinner is called fruit frenzy and when the spinner lands on this you take one face down card from the table and move it to start a smaller pool, each player takes a card from their hand and place it face down on the table too, on the count of 3 each player grabs for a card in the small pool and then the 1 that is left is returned to the main pool.
==Opinions==
When we first played this game we didn't play with the fruit frenzy option as Sophie couldn't get the idea of it and kept getting upset, after a couple of games we started using all options on the spinner and Sophie now gets excited when we hit fruit frenzy although this option is more fun when more people play. My younger daughter is only 2 and too young to understand the gaje but she enjoys playing to and will pick the cards from the table for myself and can happily pick the correct card when I tell her to pick up a certain fruit.
Sophie enjoys playing this game although she does sulk when she looses so we make sure she does loose at least one game each time we play as we are trying to make her realise you cannot win everything. The game is pretty quick to play which is great as with working full time a house to run and 2 young children we often don't have time to play long games so this is an ideal alternative. We also sometimes use the game to play pairs as it is an easier game for Emily to join in with and of course there is more than one of each pair so there is more chance of finding a pair than with a traditional pairs game. You could use the set to play snap but as the cards are so thick it would be hard to keep hold of your pile so we don't play snap with them.
I think the game is well priced and it is great quality so you really do get what you pay for, the Orchard Games are brillaint and we are slowly building up our collection as they are loads of fun and your children don't realise that they are learning new things at the same time. We would all recommend this game and despite the problem with the spinner I would still rate this 5 stars.
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Phonics Flashcards
by CosmicLove
Ages ago, I saw this adorable little set of flash cards on Amazon and bought them along with some other stuff for my little boy. This was when he was about 4 months old.
Obviously at that point they weren't of much use so I stashed them away with all of the other stuff that I had for when he was older and they were forgotten ... about. I just recently found them again when I was searching for things for him to do new activities with.
I wasn't too sure about introducing them into his activities to be honest because Malakai is only 14 months old, but seeing as he thrives on visual stimulation I dug them out for him to start using and figured they could be put away again if he didn't have any interest in them.
Kai has learnt almost all of his animals & sounds from the repetitive picture books that we have, which was why I was hoping he'd like these - flash cards and picture books are pretty similar, in my eyes. There are 44 cards, each with a picture of an object or animal with the word of the object/species of animal written below.
Each card is very clear and brightly illustrated, the cards are the right size to hold easily and the words are written in black lowercase letters. I paid £6 or around there for the set of cards and we have already used them a few times in under a week and as i only introduce 5 at at a time and the order of them can be mixed up I think we will get a LOT of use out of them!
Using the cards is really fun and Kai has enjoyed looking at them. He is only 14 months so I don't put any pressure on him, I just get five of them out, take one and read the word out, show Kai the card and give it to him to hold and then explain to him what the object is, or if it is an animal I will make some stupid animal noise! He shows a deep interest in each card, studying each one in detail and babbling away to himself and the cards keep him occupied, intrigued and focused.
The cards are very well made with cute illustrations and they are a great distraction activity, which I recommend.
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ELC Electronic Pairs
by Whizz11
We bought this for my daughter this year and although she is probably still a bit too young for it I think its an excellent way of introducing words and sounds and a visual way of showing her the pictures of the words as well. The Early Learning Centre describe this as a game that gets you to, "Match up the word cards with the ... pictures and letters. Great for learning letter names and phonic sounds."
The set comes with a red plastic tablet which is where you put the batteries and where the cards are placed and the speaker on it, a little owl figurine and a green case which holds all the cards in it. The little owl figurine looks like a little professor but actually doesn't really do anything but its a nice little toy and my little girl calls this game the owl game.
I find the case quite handy as it means when you are packing everything up you have a specific place to put it and hopefully this way no cards get lost. The green holder then sits ontop of the red tablet when not in use.
There are 26 picture pairs and word cards and they are pretty much the first words that every child should begin to know. For example, A is apple. You get a picture card with a nice picture of a big red juicy apple and an A and an a on opposite sides of the card. I like that is shows both lower case and upper case letters as these are important to learn. Other pictures include an elephant, a house, a dog, an umbrella to name but a few. They you have 26 words cards which just simply have the corresponding word written on them in plain black writing. These words are easy to read and all begin with a capital letter.
On the side of the red tablet there is a button which you can push one of two ways. In one game you simple place the card on the unit and it will say for example, Tree, - tree begins with the letter T. This is the simple game and is quite effective and my little girl likes this one as she can easily place a card on there and like to hear what it does.
The other game you can play is a bit more in depth and involves the unit asking you to find the matching card to the other one that you have placed on the unit. For example if you put the Igloo word card on the unit it will ask you to find the Igloo picture and if you get the right one on there it will tell you correct, you have found the Igloo.
What I also like about these cards is that they are just fun to use on their own as a sort of flash card and I usually find myself holding one up for my little girl to see and asking her what letter is on it or what picture is on it.
This is a really great game if your child is learning to read or it can be fun to just use as a game of words and pictures.
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