Tag Archives: Education

Book, Review

Give the Gift of Highlights™ this Christmas

When I was growing up my Aunt Cindy bought me a subscription to Highlights™ Magazine. I loved that magazine for all the fun stories inside and also the Hidden Pictures®. There was also Goofus and Gallant, two kids who taught us about manners and more. Every time I was at a doctor’s office or dentist there was Highlights™ Magazine. It was everywhere and I enjoyed it very much. Now Highlights™ has branched out into educational workbooks for kids as well as a giant book of Secret Hidden Pictures® Puzzles. I was sent some of these for free to review with Andrew. This is what we thought.

We received the Highlights™ Big Fun Workbooks for First and Second Grades. Andrew is in First but he loves doing workbooks and he is quite smart so I figured that he could do the Second Grade level work. He can. He likes to be challenged and to figure things out. These workbooks have so many different parts to them and they are filled with the humor and wonder that Highlights™ has always been known for. I feel confident that Andrew is adding to his knowledge by using these workbooks. Here is more about the workbooks from the official Highlights™ description. Continue reading Give the Gift of Highlights™ this Christmas →

Disney, Toys

Create the Droid You’re Looking For with #littleBits Droid Inventor Kit #inventorswanted

droid inventor kit built

On October 9 – 11 I attended a Disney Press Event for THOR: RAGNAROK. My hotel and airfare and meals were taken care of while I was in L.A. Opinions and observations as well as recaps and such are all my own. This post will also contain some affiliate links to Amazon.com.

One of the things that we did during this trip was a luncheon with littleBits. While at this lunch we were able to try out the Droid Inventor Kit. While I played with it as R2-D2 I then decided that I wanted to see what else I could create using the littleBits that were available to me.

I made my own Droid with littleBits

With the kit you can create R2-D2 and make him do a whole bunch of things. You can drive him, make him color using a marker, use the force to move him and even use R2-D2 as a proximity sensor. Your creativity does not have to stop at simply using the kit. You can design your own droid using other materials like a milk carton. I had a bunch of fun ideas on how to make our own droids. That is a good idea because there is a major contest happening which I will tell you about later in the post.

littleBits Droid Inventor Kit bits

After having spent some time with the littleBits Droid Inventor Kit I can say that it is a great toy for the holidays. This is a toy that kids will be able to experiment with and use their imaginations to create fun Droids. This is a great STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math) Toy. The bits are so easy to snap together because they connect with magnets and only connect in specific ways that work. This cuts down on frustration with the kids. Kids can learn and explore with the kit and the app. They will have hours of fun learning and exploring. Continue reading Create the Droid You’re Looking For with #littleBits Droid Inventor Kit #inventorswanted →