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Leapfrog Tag Scooby Doo Book
by jo1976
I bought my middle son the Leapfrog Tag reading system for his fourth birthday last year and, over the course of the last eighteen months, have acquired a number of books for him to use with the reader. This 'Scooby Doo Shiny Spooky Knights' book was one of the first that I purchased and is still a popular choice at bedtime, although it ... is no longer one of my son's favourite Tag books.
For anybody unfamiliar with the Tag system, it is a handheld device which cleverly 'reads' aloud words and sound effects when it is placed against the pages of a range of Leapfrog tag stories. The reader only functions with the special Tag books and these have to be purchased separately from the Tag reader itself. The reader generally retails at £29.99 and the individual stories are around £10-£15 each, making this potentially quite an expensive gift.
The books themselves are pretty much like any other hard backed story, and are a good size for youngsters to handle easily whilst still being portable and easy to store. The interior pages are quite glossy but can mark and tear easily, however, particularly if well-loved which is a little disappointing considering the relatively high purchase price. I would prefer it if the pages were slightly thicker, especially as they need to withstand regular prodding by the Tag reading device.
In order for the reader to respond to the books, the audio software needs to be loaded on to the reader separately for each book purchased, via a laptop or pc. This is a very simple process but can take several minutes per book, so I would recommend setting this up before giving this to an impatient child.
Once the audio is added, this book can be used in a number of ways by the child. My son tends to 'read' the story first in its entirety and then moves on to some of the activities on the back pages. Personally, I think the actual story element within this particular book is fairly weak although it does appeal to my five year old son. Constant repeats of the classic cartoon are shown on kids' TV channel, Boomerang, so Scooby Doo remains as popular as ever and is a character that was instantly recognised by my son.
I do think the story itself could have been better as it doesn't follow the usual Scooby Doo format at all. Most of us associate Scooby Doo and the gang with their habit of unearthing a mystery and then unmasking the bad guy at the end. This is always accompanied by that distinctive phrase 'Those Pesky Kids!' I found it a bit disappointing that this story deviates from that formula and instead has Scooby and the gang ending up in a mysterious castle. They soon come to believe that the castle is haunted, as they happen up scary knights, vampires, witches and ghosts, amongst other scary characters. There is a (mildly) amusing twist at the end of the story but no unmasking and no 'pesky kids'! That minor quibble aside, the story should appeal to most young fans as all of the gang are here, complete with the correct voices and familiar catchphrases.
The only other minor disappointment with this Tag book is that there does appear to be quite a few blank spaces, compared to others in the range. There is an entire blank page and lots of expanses of sky, whereas the other books seem to have characters and images dotted about over every available corner. As each image has its own accompanying phrase, tune or sound effect, this book doesn't seem to offer as much to a child who just wants to play and listen to fun noises at times, rather than concentrating on the reading elements.
Many tag books come with an age recommendation from 4-6 but this particular book is recommended for children from 5-7. I must admit that I disregarded this recommendation when I purchased it for my then four year old but I can see that some of the vocabulary included within the story and within some of the tasks is pretty challenging. As this is a Scooby Doo story and true to the series, it also includes several catchphrases that aren't actually real words - so there are plenty of made up words such as 'zoinks' and 'jinkies' that a child may struggle to identify. There is also the potential for confusion whenever Scooby 'talks' in the book as the replaces the beginning letters of words with an R, so 'look' becomes 'rook' and so on. This shouldn't be too much of a problem if the child is using the Tag to read these words aloud but this does mean this book may not be the best choice for a first Tag book.
The story does have quite a lot of educational value, however, particularly within the two main activities on the back pages. One of these activities is really effective at reinforcing the learning throughout the rest of the story and concentrates on testing the child's comprehension of the story and remembering who has done what and why. This task also helps to focus on the key questioning words- Who? What? When? Where? Why?- so that the reader really has to think about the content of the story and understand it. My son's favourite task is one which involves identifying all of the features of the castle. This is one where I feel it may be aimed at slightly older children, as it includes quite obscure words such as portcullis, battlement and bartizan, but it does broaden a child's vocabulary and knowledge about castles and seems to appeal to my son.
With most of the tasks and activities, the Tag will impose a time limit and also indicates my son's score at the end of the activity, offering praise and encouragement when he manages to improve on a previous score. Parents can keep track of these scores and obtain information about their child's learning and progress by connecting the Tag reader up to a PC. This isn't something that really appeals to me as I'm content to know that this book is encouraging a general love of literacy and learning, rather than worrying about any specific learning targets.
This Scooby Doo tag book is currently available for just over £13 via a third party seller on Amazon. I paid just £8.70 when I purchased it eighteen months ago, so it is well worth keeping an eye on the fluctuating prices as this book is frequently available for less than £10.
We have quite a collection of Tag books now. (We actually have ten, which is the maximum that can be stored on the reader at any one time.) This one isn't the best amongst the books we own but is certainly a strong contender and I do think the tasks and activities are educational whilst still managing to be fun, which can be a difficult balance to achieve. I would recommend this book as part of a growing Tag collection although it's probably not the best to start with due to some of the unusual vocabulary included and the challenging nature of some of the tasks.
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Leapfrog Magnet Zoo Animal Playset
by emmad5689
==The Purchase==
We bought our youngest daughter this toy for her second birthday, I have always liked the Leapfrog toys and felt that this toy would be no different and liked that it would teach her about some wild animals that she hasn't encountered yet. I bought the toy from Amazon and it cost around £15 and came with free ... delivery which is great in my opinion as I find it much easier to shop online but don't like having to pay a fortune to receive my parcel.
==Packaging==
The toy comes packaged in a cardboard box bright green in colour the same colour as the majority of Leapfrog toys are packaged in. The front of the box is covered in plastic, it states in the top corner that there are 25 different combination which can be made with the pieces and it tells you in the bottom corner that the toy is meant for children from ages 12 months to 36 months.
==The Toy Base==
The toy is made of brightly coloured hard plastic, the main part of the toy is bright green in colour and then it ha a carry handle at the top right hand side which is bright yellow in colour and has a Giraffes head at the bottom so that the handle is made to look like it's a giraffes neck. My daughter loves anything which has a carry handle as she has an obsession about carrying things around with her. At the top of the handle area is the speaker and on the bottom under the handle is the control which is a red sliding button which has off, low volume and high volume on it, I always think having volume controls on it is brilliant especially when both my girls insist on playing different noisy toys at the same time.
The toy has a brown archway on it which states Zoo across the top and has the Leapfrog logo and then within the archway there are two indented areas where you put the halves of the animals in. The toy has loads of detailing on it like a little butterfly in one corner and an iguana in the other corner but they are just in the main green colour so they don't jump out at you which I think is great as then your child keeps discovering new parts to the toy. On the back of the toy there is a the battery compartment which is secured by a screw which is always a good thing as you wouldn't want your child getting hold of the batteries, the toy takes 2 x AA batteries and they do seem to last pretty well as we haven't had to change them in a couple of months.
==The Animals==
The toy comes with ten different animal pieces, there is ahead piece and a bottom piece of five different animals, the animals in the set are a seal, a toucan, a zebra, a monkey and a tiger. The pieces are all made of the same hard green plastic as the main toy and then the top of them is shaped like the animal with an animal sticker on the piece. The base of the piece is curved at the top on the head pieces and curved at the bottom on the bottom pieces and the curves are to one side too which means that your child can only put the head pieces in the top space on the toy and the bottom pieces in the bottom space on the toy.
==Playing with the Toy==
The animals are all brightly coloured and the pictures are nice and bold, there is enough detail that you can see easily what the animal is but not too much detail to make the toy complicated for young children. When you first turn the toy on it sounds of the jungle such as a monkey and an elephant and you can hear other little noises in there too, if the toy isn't played with it will every so often set the same noise off again which of course then draws your child back to play with the toy again. When you place a piece of an animal into the toy it will announce what the animal is and something about it such as blue seal and then makes the noise of a seal, if you then place the other piece of the animal in the toy will again announce blue seal before singing a little tune to congratulate your child on making a correct match. If you place a piece in the toy and the second piece you place into it doesn't match then the toy will announce what combination your child has made such as a Toucan-Tiger and then sing a song about it and tell your child it is a silly combination. The toy says that your child has made a silly combination in a nice jokey voice but I still think it would be better to say they've made a funny combination instead.
The toy is pretty easy for your child to play with, as I have already said the animal pieces are shaped in such a way that they cannot be placed into the wrong space. The pieces are magnetic so when your child places them into the space on the toy they click in really easily as the magnet pulls them in. Once the pieces are in your child needs to push down on them which activates the toy, it doesn't take much pressure to set the toy off so it is easy for young children to work. The whole toys itself is magnetic so you can stick it onto the likes of a fridge for your child to play with, I don't bother and my daughter just plays with it on the floor or at the table but the option is there if you want to use it.
==Opinions==
My daughter wasn't that bothered by this toy to begin with as she kept trying to put the pieces in the wrong way and getting stressed with it and then not bothering to play with it. I played with the toy with my daughter lining up all the heads the right way over the top of the toy and all the bottoms of the animals the right way at the bottom of the toy and then we played together and she loved it. When you get the monkey noise she likes to copy off it and then she giggles like mad at it, seems like I might be right when I call her a little monkey!! She loves it when she gets the right combination but for all the toy says when it is right of wrong there is no change in the tone of voice and you get a song no matter whether right or wrong so I think it is quite hard for a child to know if they have managed to get a correct combination or not. The toy not only teaches animal names and animal sounds but also teaches colours too and if you press on the Giraffes head it will play 5 different tunes for your child too.
This toy is supposed to be suitable from 12 months and up but I think this is wrong as the animal pieces have stickers on them and any child of that age is still putting things in their mouths and so the pieces will get damaged. I think this is a great toy, my daughter loves playing with it now and she loves the animal sounds, the toy is durable as long as it isn't getting chewed and it is very brightly coloured so your child wants to play with it. I was actually amazed at how quickly Emily has managed to work out which ones match and which ones don't and she now tells you off if you try and put the wrong combinations together, this is a great toy and gets 5 stars from our household.
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Leap Frog Leap Pad Learning System Pink/Purple
by emmad5689
My eldest daughter was given a box of old consoles from a friend of ours, unfortunately the only console that still worked (they had been stored in a box in the garage) was the Leapfrog Leappad system.
I have always liked Leapfrog toys they are really great for kids, educational and tend to be easy to use so I was quite ... pleased that we had been given the system and a great number of books for it for free.
The Leappad comes in 2 colours options, you can get green and blue and then pink and purple obviously aimed at boys and girls although ours is green and blue and I have 2 daughters but the colour of it really doesn't matter. The console is a little old now and many more have been released since this one but you can still buy it from the likes of Ebay for around £10.
The console is made to help children with their reading and it is made to seem like a plastic book, the console is large being slightly bigger than A4 size and the front ¾ of it opens up and then you put the book inside. On the part of the front which doesn't open up there is a small circular speaker and an small on and off button.
The console has a section on the back which is screwed into place and underneath it houses the batteries, the console take 4 x AA batteries and I would suggest using good batteries or rechargeables as this thing eats battery power.
To use the system you have to place the cartridge which comes with each book into the console, the section where the cartridge goes is highlighted in green and it is easy to put the cartridge in and you can feel it click into place. You then need to place the matching book for the cartridge into the centre of the console which opens up when you press down on the side of the flap, turn the console on and you are ready to go. Inside the console there is a pen which is attachhed via a wire and is how your child works their way through the books and plays the games that there are also within the books.
There are a couple of different stages of books for the system, the first stage is from age 4-8 and then the second stage is from age 6-8, my daughter is 5 but we were given a range of stages of books so she has played with them even though some of them are not her stage yet. The books come in a wide range of character options and then there are books which are based around the character Leap, the books help with learning to read, understanding sounds and have games for your child to play too.
The system is really good and very educational, my daughter loves playing on this system and the books even though she has other systems from this company and around the same ideas. The console is really durable, it has been played with by my friends two children and now my own and apart from being a bit grubby it is in perfect working order. I will not tell you about the games as they will feature in other reviews so I won't bore you twice. A really great thing about this system now is that since it is quite old you can pick up the console and the books for it really cheaply.
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