Little Passports Early Explorers – Landmarks

Last week we received our second delivery of the Little Passports Early Explorers edition, which is designed for preschoolers aged 3-5. As a Little Passports ambassador we have received a three-month subscription to the series to review. For older children there is a World edition for 6-10 year olds. It’s a great way to start to introduce different countries and cultures to young children.

To help your little one on their journey they are guided by Max and Mia who own a dog called Toby. Each month you get a different themed parcel through the post, this months was Landmarks.

Our second parcel contained:

• Five plastic models of well known landmarks – the Leaning Tower of Pizza, the Great Wall of China, the Taj Mahal, the Eiffel Tower and a Sphinx
• Flashlight adventure looking at various landmarks
• 20 page activity booklet
• Wall sticker
• Landmark sticker for his little suitcase

Straight away Monkey wanted to add his sticker to his much loved orange suitcase which we did before turning our attention to the landmarks. First of all Monkey wanted to place them on his world map so we matched the landmarks to the map. This then sparked conversation about the other landmarks on the map and which ones we have visited. Which actually turned out to be more than I expected. Monkey decided he would like to see the Great Wall of China like Daddy! Hmmm better start saving.

We then played with the flashlight adventure. If you have not come across these before there is a picture of a flashlight/torch in card and at the end it has a white circle of light. You run this under the cellophane pictures which then effectively lights them up. Its a great idea and Monkey loved whizzing it around the pictures picking out the landmarks which we then matched with his main map.

Next was the activity booklet, at three and a half, Monkey can complete all of the exercises with very little intervention from me. The first activity is to circle the landmark which does not appear on the continent in question. This is a great exercise as it starts to introduce the different areas of the world. Each continent is a different colour, Monkey recognises things easily by colour now so we used this option when describing where we were looking for landmarks. There is also an exercise later on in the booklet linking landmarks to continents using colour. He remembered a similar activity from the first activity booklet and went straight to it, as its one of his favourites, happily drawing lines from the landmark to the continent. I also liked that they include some more alternative activities such as identifying which pictures are taken during the day and which are taken at night.

It then went onto sequencing, this is not a concept that I have introduced to Monkey yet. Although it is on my to do list! They are simple as you would expect for this age group, using two landmarks and alternating them. I was intrigued to see if Monkey would get the concept, but he did straight away and got them all right. Another activity which we have not tried yet is spot the difference, although while we were doing it I was wondering why since its great for developing observational techniques. There were five to spot and once I had given him an example he was well away. Other activities in the booklet we have not photographed include colouring, dot to dot, a maze, follow the circles as well as number and shape recognition.

At the back of the activity guide it gives you some further suggestions to take the learning further if you wanted to use this as a basis of a homeschooling unit or similar. Each subsequent delivery we receive will include:

• 20 page activity booklet
• Souvenirs
• Flashlight adventures
• Stickers and wall decals

We are expecting the music edition next, other themes include – animals, food, art, natural wonders, oceans, world coins, space, world discoveries, dinosaurs, science, celebrations, habitats, transportation, insects and sports.

It’s possible to buy a 12 month, 6 month or a single month subscription. The 12 month plan equates to 13.95$ a month plus shipping. You can find out more information on their website here. We will be signing up to a 12 month subscription ourselves because we love it so.

We were provided with the Early Explorers Edition to review all opinions are my own.