I am already starting to thik ahead for Christmas and 2nd Birthday coming up. My daughter loves the computer yet we try to limit time with DVD's and computer. She literally climbs up to the desk, opens the laptop and turns on her DVD. So, I was wondering if she would enjoy one of the educational electronic book or computer toys like the Leap Pad by Leap Frog or the V-Smile by V-tech.
Both of these items have a initial purchase and then additional books or cartridges to add to them. I feel that you need to choose one and stick with it. I am wondering if you have had one of these toys if you like it? Does your child like it? At what age? Is is something that is meant to be played iwth independently or with a parent's assistance? (either is fine, just curious) Do you think they are worth the cost? Do you think your child learns from them?
Thanks for your input.
I have both for my son. We used the leap pad to help with his reading. I liked the V-Smile because it was an educational game that teaches more than just reading. It is a fun educational video game.
My son is now getting to old fof his V-smile. It looks brand new. If you want his I will be more than happy to give it to you with the games.
You can contact me at ###-###-####. L.
My son is 16 months, he is not interested in his VTech VSmile baby and I've bought a few different cartridges. Every child is different though and he can't seem to put it together that the lap remote goes to the tv. He thinks a toy is a toy and the tv is the tv but yet he uses the remotes to try to change the channel. :/ Just want to give my input. :) Good Luck!
We got a My First Leap Pad when our daughter was 2 1/2 and she could do a few things with it independently at first. The batteries went dead so I put it away for a while (literally, about a year) and just pulled it back out last week and now, at 4, she had a great time with it. The books that go with it teach math, phonics, etc., and she really likes the games. My son, who is now 2 1/2 also had fun with it, though he got frustrated after a while when left to play with it independently. However, he's quite content if his sister or one of us helps him out with it a little.
I don't know anything about the V-smiles.
I am all for Leap pad products! My sons have the leap pad and leapster. We bought the v-smile first but took it back after a couple of days using it because it didn't work correclty and it felt cheap. My brother's kids have the v-smile and he says they are always having to restart it because it freezes up all the time.
hi C.. i bought both the leap pad and the v smile for my son. the leap pad we use at night or on the run ( u know doctors appointments etc) when he wants to read and the v smile is for home use. the loves them both!!! the leap pad made reading fun!!! sometimes just for the fun of it he won't watch tv and pick up his leap pad to hear it read to him. these items are soo worth their price!!!!
I would say it would have to depend on what your child enjoys most. We have a V-Smile for my daughter that she got for Christmas when she was 3 and she has a Little Touch Leappad that she got for her bday when she was 3. Does she enjoy playing learning games or would she more enjoy "reading" a book? V-Smile has some cute, educational games to go with it, however the problem we ran into when she first got it is that the number of games for her age group at the time was limited. She also couldn't do much of anything on some of the games without help, which frustrated her(she's very independent). My daughter enjoys her V-Smile much more now at age 5 than she did at age 3.
On the other hand, a Little Touch LeapPad or My First LeapPad would be wonderful for child your daughter's age. She will grow out of the Little Touch pretty quickly though, so I'd recommend the My First LeapPad. The books for the LeapPads are age appropriate for the type of LeapPad you have. IE: the books for the Little Touch LeapPad are suitable for children between 6-36mos which is the age range for THAT system. Some of the systems can use cartridges from more than one system, but not all of them are interchangeable.
We don't have experience with V-Smile but we got our daughter the My First LeapPad for her second birthday back in August since it was on clearance. She absolutely loves it. We're just using the first book that it came with (although we plan to get the Dora book and cartridge as a big sister present when #2 is born next month). She doesn't understand all of the games on each page but she learned the basics of the system pretty quickly so she's still able to have fun using it without assistance from us. And actually, the fact that she doesn't play all of the games yet is a good thing since as she gets older there will still be new things for her to learn and practice.
We've been looking at these, too! :)
I haven't seen any of the "computer" stuff labeled for children under 3, though, and I would have to say that they are designed to be played with a parent's assistance/supervision, and as they grow older, independently. I agree with you on choosing one system and sticking with it, although we haven't decided which system we want, either.
We bought the Leapster for our 4 year old daughter and she loves it! Our son has the Nintendo DS and this is small and resembles the DS so she thinks it is so cool. She played with it for hours that first day and she still likes to pull it out to play. They don't have as many games as I'd like, but she has 4 games she plays.
