Flashcards Come to Life with #CypherKidsClub

You've seen me write about lots of toys on Mommy Testers, but one thing I haven't touched on are flashcards.  Some people don't believe in them but I beg to differ.  We used flash cards back before Kayla could talk and she did actually learn to do the things on them like clap, wave, raise her arms etc.   It was similar to learning baby sign language.

Some of our friends tried doing the same thing and it didn't work for them, so it goes to show how every child is different.  Now that Kayla is a few years older we still reference those flashcards every once in a while for word recognition and context but I get the feeling that her interest would be held better if there was another element to the cards.

Enter Cypher Kids Club.  They make cards that interact with your iPad or iPhone and turn a normal flashcard into a 3D experience.

On the first rainy weekend in a while I rounded up our family and headed for Target to replenish our depleted supply of everyday needs and grab some Halloween candy.  While perusing the iPad accessory department for an upcoming trip back to NY I found the Cypher Kids cards.  There were a few different types, letters, numbers and wild animals.

I was torn on which set to get because the wild animal cards looked pretty great but Kayla is obsessed with learning letters right now so we decided on the letters cards.  I liked that they showed both uppercase and lowercase letters because we really need to work on teaching her the lowercase letters.

Each Cypher Kids letter card has the upper and lower case letters on the front and an object that starts with that letter as well as a trigger point for the card on the back.  In order to use them you just need to do a simple and free download from the iTunes store.  Once you have that download you are ready to go!

I always like to test out a product myself before handing it over to Kayla so there is minimal frustration as she figures out how it works.  I was glad I did because I realized that the Cypher Kids cards were pretty great but holding the iPad or iPhone at the proper distance and angle was important.

At first I was holding the iPad too close and not at enough of an angle from the card so I couldn't see all the neat action going on.  I quickly figured out that I needed to hold the iPad almost vertically while looking at the image and suddenly things came to life.

First the W's danced around and explained what sounds they made and put on a little performance.  Then the w's turned into a swimming orca whale like the one on the card and I was encouraged to play with the whale and touch its spout on the screen.

Naturally, Kayla could not wait to get her hands on the letter cards and I was more than happy to let her dive in.  She couldn't decide which letter to start with and we spent a good 10 minutes first just going through the different letters and coordinating pictures.

Kayla initially made the same mistake that I had made with the positioning of the iPad but we quickly worked it out and she had so much fun!  She played with them so long that we were almost late for school.  Since we have a couple of cross country flights coming up I'm seriously considering going back to Target for the wild animal cards.

Interested in getting a set of #CypherKidsClub cards for someone you know?  I happen to think they are a great option for kids who aren't engaged by conventional flash cards.  They're available at select Target stores around the US.

Just so you know, 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 as always everything you see is my personal and very picky opinion.