Customer Reviews

LeapFrog Fridge Phonics Magnetic Alphabet Set - Styles May Vary

5 star:		(780)
4 star:		(106)
3 star:		(30)
2 star:		(18)
1 star:		(53)

 

 

My 4-year-old daughter is a former micropreemie and as a result, she is profoundly delayed, non-verbal/non-sign, and has autistic traits and sensory integration dysfunction (SID/DSI). She functions at about a 15-month old level. She got this toy for her birthday and it is AMAZING!!! She is identifying letters...if I say, "where's the K?" she'll put the K magnet in the toy. Since she has autistic traits, she likes repetition, and this is the perfect thing! She is even starting to say some letter sounds like, "mmm, mmm, mmm". She has MANY Leap Frog toys, and this is another great one to add to the list!! My daughter licks *everything* in sight, including the letter magnets of this toy, and it has not affected the ability of this toy to work.

*** Note to parents/friends of Autistic/SID/DSI kids - My daughter "stims" on several of her toys, but this one doesn't cause her to do it as bad. She sometimes likes to push the button of the toy without a letter tile to hear it go "blingy, bling", and sometimes will push the letter tile/magnet repeatedly at the beginning of the song so it goes, "A/A/A/A...A says/A says...but like I said, not as bad as with other auditory toys. ***

I do find that I have the "A says ah and A says ayy" song in my head a lot. There are two volume settings and an off switch. However, even on the low setting this toy is awfully loud. We put clear packing tape over the speaker and that helped a lot. The ABC song and the letter sounds song are the ones you will find on other Leap Frog toys and the Leap Frog videos. This is good if you want reinforcement...which my daughter needs.

The magnets are nice and strong. If they come off the fridge, they aren't too bad to step on either :-o! ...unlike the "traditional" letter/number magnets.

The toy is very multisensory - kinesthetic, auditory, visual (color/letter), and tactile. Kudos to Leap Frog for another great educational toy!

My 6 year-old also likes to help his sister with this toy. He loves to arrange the letters for her and quiz her. Then he likes to spell words and teach them to her. The vowels are red and the consonants are yellow or blue. So I ask my daughter to find letters based on certain colors to increase the educational value. Unfortunately, her name has two l's and two e's, so we can't spell her name with the letters.

This is a GREAT toy. My daughter is 23 months and loves playing with this toy. It's great that it's in the kitchen too so I can cook or clean while she plays. She has pulled it off the fridge and banged it a few times and it still works great. I love that she is learning the alphabet so early. She now recognizes letters and points them out to me. We had foam letters for the tub too, but this is the best and most fun. We love Leap Frog!

This is an amazing product. My mother purchased it for my 1 year old at Christmas, and even though she doesn't understand it yet on an educational level, it works on her motor skills because she has to pick the letters off of the fridge and put them correctly in the spot for them. She then gets the reward of listening to it sing to her. My four year old daughter will sit in front of the refrigerator for what seems like forever and just arrange the letters in order while she sings the alphabet song along with the toy. My oldest daughter who is six will sometimes even go to the magnets when she is stuck on a reading word and I tell her to sound it out. Lastly, every child that comes to our house is drawn to the magnets. They all love it, and so do I !

I bought this toy for my 2 1/2 year old. She loves it!!! She loves to sing along with. She doesn't even realize that she is learning her letters and the sounds they make. She especially loves that it also plays the ABC song. This is a wonderful toy!!!

My son will turn 3 years old next week. I bought this for him for successfully being potty trained, finally. Anyway....I only wish this had come out last year! He absolutely loves it. I do too. He dances to the Leap Frog tune of each letter and repeats the letter sounds. It keeps him busy while I cook dinner too! This makes singing the alphabet more fun than listening to me sing it. He has almost mastered singing the whole alphabet in just one week. The little compartment you stick the letters into is small enough and the whole thing sticks to the fridge like glue so it won't fall off everytime they stick a letter in it. The only negative comment I have about it is that I only wish Leap Frog had included the numbers as well. Enjoy learning letters with your child!

I thought that my child would be able to place a letter in the special gadget that comes with this product and quickly hear the sound the letter makes. I thought that we could quickly place three letters in the gadget in a row, and hear their sounds, rapid fire. For example, I thought you could place the letters D, O, and G on the fridge and quickly get to hear all of the sounds in the word dog. I based my assumption on the fact that some of Leap Frog's products allow you to hear the letter sounds without being distracted by songs that tell about the letter names. (The Leap Frog caterpillar toy called Alphabet Pal allows you to do this.)
When you place a letter in this gadget, though, the gadget sings an entire song from The Talking Letter Factory movie by Leap Frog: "The A says Aaah, the A says Aaah, every letter makes a sound, the A says Aaah." The song is informative, but it's lengthiness gets in the way of showing a child that letter sounds can be glued together to make words. In order to show your child that D,O, and G make the word DOG, you have to listen to the D song and then the whole O song and then the whole G song.
I would only recommend this product to a child who does not know his letter sounds at all - not to a child who is ready to put letter sounds together to make words. My one year old son was a more appropriate user of this product than my three year old.
I would not recommend this product to a parent or teacher who wants to avoid teaching letter names until letter sounds are mastered.

I bought one for my Kindergarten class and one for my 11month old- it is a big hit with both groups. What a great way to make the fridge letters more fun! The letter sounds are very clear! It is great!

My son is 3yrs & 8 mths old. Prior to buying these I had the plain magnetic letters on the fridge. Unfortunately, my son played with them mostly when I was busy preparing supper. Because he is still learning his letters he sometimes put the letters upside down and then asked me what letter it was. I found myself having to turn the letter around and then telling him what the letter was. After a while he kept asking me if "this was right" (in other words, was the letter upside down)? He became frustrated with not having the letters in the right direction. With this toy, you can only place the letters in the correct direction. It clearly states what the letter is and cheerfully sings the alphabet song with a push of a button. A BIG PLUS- VOLUME CONTROL. Two draw backs. One is that every letter has a song that is VERY MUCH THE SAME and as with most toys keeping track of all the pieces is a problem. Even though they belong on the refridgerator, we have searched high and low looking for one missing letter many times. Recently our search ended after we finally found the missing letter in the GARBAGE (naturally, not on top). Overall, it is 100% better than the plain letters mainly because EVERY time you place a letter on the device it states the name of the letter and the sound. Also, letter recognition is enhanced because children are not allowed to place the letters in the device upside down.

This product was given to my daughter for her first birthday. At first my husband and I were concerned that it was to "old" for her, but we put it on the fridge anyway just to see how it went. Good thing we did, our daughter LOVES playing with it while we are in the kitchen and anytime she can get to it. She loves hearing the sounds of the letters and the ABC song. She quickly learned how to put the magnets in the main magnet to make it work. Although, she is not familiar with her letters, I believe this is a great early start to her learning of them. We are going to a birthday party this weekend and our daughter will be giving the birthday boy the Leap Frog Fridge Phonics Set. We think this is a great education toy....Leap Frog has done it AGAIN....Bravo!

My 2 year old son got this for Christmas. He loved it from the moment it came out of the box. I can actually get things done in the kitchen now since he sits at the refrigerator and plays with this toy. The best part has been that this toy has helped him begin to imitate sounds. He is speech delayed, so anything that helps with speech sounds is a sure winner in this house!