Hobbies And Interests
Babies
Plenty of educational technology toys are available for babies. Tech toys for babies include electronic books, reactive plush animals and learning mats. Additionally, many manufacturers of baby products put educational toys directly into swings, bouncers, gyms and saucers so that infants can manipulate buttons in order to create light and sound. Popular educational technology toys for babies include the LeapFrog Little Touch Leap Pad Learning System, the LeapFrog Learning Baby Tad, the Fisher Price Laugh &Learn collection of learning toys, and the VTech Move &Crawl Ball.
Toddlers
When children reach the toddler stage, educational technology toys become abundant. Toddler educational tech toys include more complex story readers, play computers and laptops, pretend cell phones, electronic kitchens and houses, and reactive dolls and plush toys. Some popular educational technology toys for toddlers include the LeapFrog Tag Junior book reader, the VTech V.Smile Educational Gaming system and the Fisher Price Smart Cycle.
Preschoolers
Many educational technology toys are available to preschoolers. These toys help prepare children for kindergarten in skills such as shape recognition, counting, letter recognition, color recognition and basic science concepts. Additionally, preschool educational tech toys begin to use more input from the child. (For example, kid-friendly digital cameras are popular for this age group.) Popular preschool tech toys include the LeapFrog Leap Pad Learning System, the Fisher Price Computer Cool School and the VTech licensed character "laptops."
Beginning Readers and Writers
Beginning readers and writers have a wealth of educational technology at their disposal. These products tend to build on preschool skills in order to build phonemic awareness, basic math concepts, basic science concepts, and basic social science skills. Many toys also use input from children at this age--items such as the VTech KidiJamz Studio allow children to create their own music, while the LeapFrog Leapster is a hand-held video game system that helps children build basic skills. Other popular educational technology toys for this age include the LeapFrog Tag Reading System, the KidiArt Studio from VTech, the V.Smile Pocket gaming system and the LeapPad Plus Writing interactive system.
School-Age Children
The educational tech toys created for school-age children become more specialized as children get older. Many toys are geared for a specific interest. For example, Lego Mindstorms robots and Technic models allow children interested in building and robotics to further their knowledge in those areas. The GeoSafari Talking Globe encourages kids to learn more about their world and the animals that live there, while the GeoSafari Talking Microscope can further an interest in science. The Fisher Price Discovery Channel Learning Projector with sounds is an other popular ed tech toy that allows children to see slides on a variety of topics.