We recently came across the fantastic series of Leap & Hop books for families who love to travel. These travel activity books are aimed at ‘kids on a grown-up trip’ and have been designed to help children to discover and understand different destinations and cultures through puzzles, games, drawing activities, scavenger hunts and more.
We recently took the Leap & Hop Myanmar book with us for our 10-day trip to Myanmar, and I have to say it was brilliant. My 5-year old daughter was so excited to have her own book all about Myanmar, and it was a great way to keep her engaged and entertained throughout our trip.
The Leap & Hop books are divided into two sections. The first part introduces the destination and covers interesting facts about its geography, history, culture, currency and food. This is all written in easy-to-understand kid-friendly terms. Some of it was over my 5-year old’s head, but we managed to break it down and learn about things that were age appropriate – even my 3-year old managed to point out the Myanmar flag wherever we went, thanks to learning about it in the book.
The second section of the Leap & Hop books concentrates on the iconic sites within the destination. We first tested this out in the Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon. We arrived at the Shwedagon Pagoda in the late afternoon, after a full day of sightseeing and so the kids were pretty tired, and ordinarily telling them we were going to visit another temple would probably have resulted in a bit of a meltdown. But thanks to the Leap & Hop book, they were excited to arrive and try out the scavenger hunt.
Thanks to the book, we learned about Burmese zodiac signs and to go and find our corresponding animal to pour water on. We also learned that all the temple bells make different sounds, and it’s ok to go and try ringing them all – and of course we had a lot of fun tracking down all the statues, bells and Buddhas in the scavenger hunt.
We continued using the book in the same manner throughout our travels in Bagan and Inle Lake. Everywhere we went my daughter would ask, “Is this place in my book? What does it say?”
We also loved that we could use the book prior to the trip to introduce where we were going to the kids, and get them excited about the trip. By saving all the activities until we were actually travelling though, there was plenty to keep my daughter busy in airports, restaurants etc while we were there.
With sections such as ‘Things About Me… and My Visit in Myanmar”, and various spaces for pasting in ticket stubs and photos, the book also makes a wonderful scrapbook souvenir for kids to keep and remember the trip.
If you are planning to take your kids on a ‘grown-up trip’, then I absolutely recommend taking a Leap & Hop book with you. My daughter completely loved it, and it was an easy way to keep both kids engaged and interested, and for them to learn so much more about Myanmar as we travelled.
Books currently available are: Bali, Cambodia, Hong Kong, India-Rajasthan, Myanmar, New York, Paris, Singapore and Sri Lanka. Other books will be coming soon, including Vietnam and Mongolia.
You can buy all books directly from the Leap & Hop website. Shipping is free for 3 or more books.
You may also like our review of the Little Passports subscription service, perfect for little travellers! Read it here.
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Note: Mum on the Move received a complimentary copy of the Leap & Hop Myanmar book for the purpose of writing this review. This in no way affected my review, and all opinions are honest, and my own.