Ukloo is an early literacy game offering a fun reading experience. - builds sight reading (visual word recognition) - provides the basics of sentence structure -introduces research skills This game is essentially a scavenger hunt designed for early readers ages 4 and up. It comes in a little box that is filled with 54 cards of clues that you hide in specific places around your home. There are three different levels of cards – with level 1 being simple basic language clues like “Look on your bed.” to more complex level three cards such as “Find it beside the milk and cookies on the table.” You can also write your own clues on the extra cards provided. At the end of the hunt, your child finds a colourful “Surprise!” card, which you can use as a reward of its own, or where you can write out a special prize – like ice cream, or a trip to the store for candy, or anything that your child will love. In the box is also a foldout “Picture Helper” sheet which gives visual cues to understand the words on the cards. This is really handy for kids who are nervous or not-so-confident in their reading abilities yet, so they can start to associate words with meanings. My oldest son (who is currently 10) decided that he wanted to set up this game for his brothers. He sifted through all the cards to find ones that we could use in our house, grabbed a final card and took off around the house to hide them. Then they got started – there were many excited footsteps running up and down the stairs as the two younger brothers ran around searching for their clues. They LOVE scavenger hunts, so this is a perfect game for them. (I tried to take pictures of them doing the hunt, but they were mostly blurs in pictures!) I did find that once they discovered the helper sheet that they got a little too dependent on it, but I think over time when words are familiar they wouldn’t check it as much. We had a great time with this game, and next time we’re going to add more cards to make the activity longer and more challenging.
