Note: This post may contain affiliate links. You can read my disclosure by clicking here. We were gifted this toy for free for this review.
Today is International Women’s Day! The 2021 theme for International Women’s Day is “Choose to Challenge”. Here’s a description of the theme on the International Women’s Day website:
“We can all choose to challenge and call out gender bias and inequality. We can all choose to seek out and celebrate women’s achievements. Collectively, we can all help create an inclusive world.”
International Women’s Day
To me this means celebrating achievements big and small with my daughter and encouraging her to challenge herself to think bigger for all her goals.
In celebration of Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day I made a short video with my daughter on Instagram that seemed to resonate with many of the viewers. Our message was that if she can see it then she can be it: my daughter sees me as an engineer, so she pictures herself as an engineer one day. You can view the video and our message below.
I enjoy spending International Women’s Day with my daughter and encouraging her to see herself as anything she wants to be when she grows up. This year we had the perfect way to spend the day together exploring our new Osmo Little Genius Starter Kit.
Osmo gifted us the Little Genius Starter Kit for my daughter and I to share with you for International Women’s Day. I love spending time with just the two of us together, and playing with our new Osmo kit was the perfect opportunity to do that this week.
The Little Genius Starter Kit is designed for kids age 3-5, so it’s perfect for my 4 year old daughter. It comes with four games. We had to download each game from the app store before playing (an iPad or Fire tablet is required to use Osmo). It also comes with an Osmo base and reflector, a silicone play mat, 38 silicone sticks and rings, and 19 costume pieces to go with the games. My daughter and I played each of the four games together, and I share our experience with each game below.
Squiggle Magic
Squiggle magic was my daughter’s favorite game in the kit. To play squiggle magic we needed the play mat and the silicone pieces. Once we started the game, it shows a face, animal or fish that my daughter tried to recreate using the silicone pieces. The images start off simple and progressively get more difficult. My daughter was able to make most of them by herself, with occasional help from me if she got frustrated.
After she recreated the image, it started moving and come to life on the iPad screen, which was fun to watch. My daughter and I played this game for more than an hour, and she would have happily continued to play with it for longer if I hadn’t told her it’s time to move on to the next game. This is a game I know she will come back to and be engaged with again and again.
ABCs
ABCs is perfect for preschool kids like my daughter to be introduced to letters, phonics and words. My daughter learned how to write all her letters this year, but creating them with the game was great practice to reinforce how to make each letter. In addition, the game helps kids practice the phonics of each letter and a word that starts with the letter.
My daughter had fun using the silicone sticks and rings to make the letters on the play mat, and then using the silicone pieces to create the shape of the word described that starts with that letter. When Mo the Monster made the letter sounds my daughter got a kick out of making the sounds with him. We were both giggling while learning phonics with Mo.
Costume Party
This is perfect for kids (like my daughter) who love dolls and dress up. It starts with a gender neutral cardboard (but very sturdy and durable) character. There are many outfit choices (hats, shirts, and bottoms) for kids to play with and create cute, silly, or wacky outfits for the character.
Once kids dress the character, they can play with colors on the iPad. They can change the color of the clothes, and of the character itself. My daughter loved playing with the colors. The character will then react on the screen to the new outfit.
Stories
Stories was a fun way to play with the characters in an interactive way. The character is acting out a story that is being read. The character comes to an obstacle during the story, and the kids have figure out which dress-up accessory can help the character overcome the obstacle.
My daughter had a lot of fun hearing the silly stories and helping her character clear the obstacles using her problem solving skills.
While we played with the Osmo Little Genius Starter Kit I told my daughter how well she was doing at all the activities and how I’m so proud of her accomplishments. In fact, while we were playing with the Osmo we had our discussion about her wanting to be an engineer like mommy when she grows up, which is what inspired my Instagram video above. 🙂
One thing I love about all the Osmo kits is it can be used as a family game where I play and learn with her, or it can be independent play time for her, so I can have a short time to myself to do dishes or write a blog post. My daughter loves for me to sit and play with her on the Osmo, but she is also happy to play with it alone when I am busy. That is so important to me as a busy mom!
Have you tried an Osmo kit yet? Which kit do you think your kids would like best?
