Lego Types and Read Aloud Systems

I was not a huge backer of Leap Frog until my daughters Kindergarten Teacher recommended the ABC/Word Factory Videos.....both my 6 and 4 year old love them and my 6 year old is now beginning to read and my 4 year old has her alphabet basics down!...With this said...We have gotten our Kindergartner the Leap Frog Tag system..and she wants one..I think this is goign to be great for both of my daughters! It can only help them more! I also got the Leap Frog Educational gamer...of course in the pink for my 4 year old with a Dora game cassette..She loves games and woudl rather her have an educational one!

So in a nut shell....Leap Frog is are great educational toys!

I know it can be frustrating to have two different sets of things. But K'nex is a wonderful building system, as is Lego. My son had both and used them both extensively -- even still gets them out from time to time and he's 15. I still have a "hand mixer" he made for me for Mother's Day one year out of K'nex. Really works! We regularly give K'nex as a gift to boys since many parents don't know about them.

Bionicles don't "work" with Lego, but they're made by Lego. Many pieces do fit onto Lego. It's another system that encourages creativity.

Hi M., As the mother of 5, and a grandmother of many cuties, I have learned 1st hand that no KNext don't go together in the normal sence but my kids have great creative minds and have them interacting all the time.
We have always liked books on tapes and CD for children and I understand that Leapfrog has some great systems. We are checking out one by Kurzweil right now because it can work with any age group to help people that want their books read to them.
Becareful when you get the knockoff style Leggo's-- they are always able to work to ether either. Nana Glenda

yes, they began making lego's and Knex systems that work together.....I personally LOVED the Knex and Legos in the home for our boys.....they have been the longest lasting "toy" in our home :o)

My advice.....invest in the 2 galloon baggies BEFORE purchasing anything new :O) The most frustrating part of legos/knex is keeping them sort of together so your "genius" can rebuild his favorites. I always kept the boxes, too, that they came in, and used them to put all the pieces into the baggie THEN back into the box. My oldest (now 13) was a lego and knex "champ" and loved and wanted EVERYTHING made. He was so easy to buy for because there was always something new. It just got to the point where we have a whole small AREA and 1/2 a closet for these items!

I know this sounds "anal", but at one point, we had SOOOO many mixed up legos that we divided them by colors into baggies and plastic drawers. This way, they could find pieces according to color on their instruction sheets. BUT... if i had known to get larger baggies ahead of time, it would've been alot eaiser! It would've never gotten to that point, though, if I had taught my son how to put his legos away from the very beginning :o)

The best thing we did was invent a medium travel box of "loose pieces" of legos and then of knex...this allows creative building anytime/anywhere without mixing up the pieces from a set :O)

"Training" is key for your son. If you teach him how to put his legos/knex away everytime, then he will be a happier kid later when he pulls it out again. And you wil be a happier mom helping him find the pieces he needs :O)

Oh yeah....my "rule" about the knex (because some of them were so large).....he was allowed to keep them up for 3-4 days, then clean them up. Some creations can take them anywhere from 3-6 hours of building, and my heart couldn't "destroy it" after all that work :O)

The creativity is ENDLESS for these products and if your son is interested in them, I highly recommend them in your home.

Merry Christmas!

~N. :O)

My kids got the TAG last Christmas and love it. All the Leap Frog products are great and I feel they really helped my children learn to read in a fun way. A year later they still bring them out. They are great to take travelling also. Before the tag we had the older model which I think was called the Leap Pad. All good.

The only down side of the TAG is that it can only hold 5 books at a time. If you want more then that you have to uninstall a book to put on another. Luckily we have 2 TAGS (twins!!) so between the two of them we have enough space for all the books they want.