Monday, March 26, 2012

3/26/12: Pathwords Jr. by ThinkFun Review

We are always looking for creative ways to help my son learn.  What better way than to combine it with something he already likes to do?  Play Games!  Well that is exactly what PathWords Jr. from ThinkFun is. 
I got to meet them briefly at Toy Fair and had the joy of being able to have my kids try out one of their games.  The whole premise of the PathWords Jr. game to to use the Tetris like style pieces to find the words you are given.  On some pages of the book they will tell you the words, on others they will just have a picture and you will need to sound out the word and spell it, and on others they had sounds that the pictures would make.  This game was right up my son's alley and he was having a fun time switching off one page for him and one for his sister.
 The game is intended for 6 and up, however my daughter is 4 (almost 5) and could play.  Sometimes she would count the letters of the word and that would help her pick the right tile to find the word, but she was doing great figuring it out.
 She particularly liked this one that she did because she told me it looked like a Giraffe when done.
Evan was really getting in to it.  There are beginner, intermediate and advanced pages so as he got used to it we could move on to more advanced ones.  The thing that is great is that he had to sound out the words to find them as not all are spelled out for you.  In fact some pages don't even have the words on them, but don't worry there is a hint/solutions book if your child gets stuck so you can help them.
Lauren was able to complete all the puzzles she had.  Plus big brother Evan was happy to help as needed.
Here is an example to see one where they gave you pictures of animals and you needed to figure out what they say and spell it out.
I love how it is a great on the road toy also as all the tiles fit in to the case nicely.  I can envision it working out well when we take our road trip to North Carolina this year.
Feel free to check out ThinkFun on Twitter: @ThinkFun or on Facebook here.
To understand more about the game, here is a nice introductory video to PathWords Jr. by ThinkFun.
Disclosure: I received this product in exchange for review. No other compensation was received and all opinions are my own.

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