My boys are crazy.
Let me rephrase that, I have two adorable and highly energetic little boys. Bear is 5 and Bug is 2 but they sometimes seem like twins because of Bear’s developmental delay and Bug being a bit advanced for his age. For a long time I felt bad that Bear had developmental delays due to his having William’s Syndrome but now it’s something I’m used to and I wouldn’t change a thing about him. In fact, I now think that I’m very lucky to have gotten him. 
Some of the challenges with teaching a child with William’s Syndrome, or ANY highly energetic child like Bug, is the fact that they have a short attention span and traditional ways of teaching them don’t really work. We are currently doing research on what kind of tablet and apps to purchase for him to help him learn better and in that process we came across Cypher Kids.
When you open the App on your phone, this is the screen that comes up. It’s easy to move the number to the one want- which was great for Bear and Bug.
After opening the Cypher Kids Numbers App and having the flash card in front of the view finder of the camera, a fun little animation pops up that moves as your child does. They can touch it and it it talks, sings and counts.
What the screen looks like and how you can take a picture with the 3D image- it was hard to get this picture because both of the boys just wanted to look through the screen!
Cypher Kids Club has 3 different sets of regular looking flash cards (Letters, Numbers, Wild Animals) that look and can be used like normal flash cards but when paired with an iPad or iPhone App come to LIFE!
I first heard about this new way of learning with augmented reality a few months ago and though it was the coolest thing ever! The fact I could have it on MY iPhone was surprising to me and I knew that I wanted to try this product for my boys partly (ok… mostly) because it was just cool. Check out my video below where I show Bear how to use the cards on my iPhone.
The fact is that I’m super busy and I don’t have time to sit down with a thick instruction booklet and figure something complex out. This was easy, quick and super cool with high-tech 3D images.
It’s really this simple-
- Order product on Apple’s store. Free shipping.
- Open package, get out flash cards.
- Download App, use product.
I’m not usually the person who brings in new technology into the family. Ben is usually the cool one so I felt pretty proud of myself. I found the cards, decided that we wanted to get the basic ones, Letter and Numbers, because of the ages of our kids.
Both my boys loved it- I know, I know- LOL I am TERRIBLE about waiting to show my kids presents!!! I just couldn’t wait until Christmas to give them their gift! But, this would make an awesome gift for any young kid who is learning and likes fun, interactive games with cool visuals.
Bug is under the recommended 3 years and up and was more interested in actually holding the flash cards and pointing to the different numbers and letters and (incorrectly) identifying them. We are going to need to work with him a little more on this… Bear however, quickly got the concept and stole my iPhone from me to start to interact with the flash card. Bear is very musical and so I immediately liked that they played a little tune with each card and when they touched the icon on the screen, it would react. (Read more about the Cypher Kids Club)
To be completely honest here, I think they would have liked it more on an iPad than my iPhone. They both enjoyed it but quickly started to play with the cards without my phone, quizzing each other which was so CUTE! Bug kept asking Bear to “read” to him which number it was then was super impressed that he knew! Bear eventually “taught” Bug how to read the number 8.
After sitting next to each other looking through the cards, they started quizzing each other. Here is Bug quizzing Bear on his numbers! They were having so much fun with the cards and were hilarious to watch.
Checking with me to see if Bear correctly identified this card! LOVE that face! :)
“What number is dis?”
So far, we love them. The cards were just under $30 each which is a little on the steep side but considering the corresponding App was free and these were learning games that could be used on a variety of devices (iPad, iPhone, iPod- and like when Grandma comes to visit I can download the free App for her and she can help work with the boys on learning!) I felt this was a fair price. The 3D images were cool and very cutting edge technology wise! In fact, while on the phone ordering these flash cards, the Apple employee that was helping me was super interested and said they might be buying them for some family friends!
Bug looking through the cards. #CypherKidsClub
and… ohmygoodness, I am such a mom. Here is a bonus video of the boys plaing with the cards. This was too cute not to share!
“I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community. This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™ and Cypher Kids Club #CBias #SocialFabric” Thoughts, opinions and in-general awesomesauce is 100% my own!