8 Games to Gift This Year

It is that time of year again, when we are trying to think about the best gifts to give to the loved ones in our lives. I am a huge fan of giving meaningful gifts that provide learning experiences while also being fun. There are so many wonderful games on the market now. We are huge fans of playing games together at our house. I love the lessons and skills my kids learn from the games that we play. I also love spending time together with them in this way. Games can be a great way to connect with one another and learn together.

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Joy of Games

After checking out new games for our Christmas lists this year, I narrowed down 8 of my favorite games that we love and we love to gift.

Bananagrams

There are several versions of this popular game: Classic Bananagrams, Big Letter Bananagrams, My First Bananagrams, Bananagrams WildTiles, and Bananagrams Party Edition.

The Classic Bananagrams is the original fast-paced game where you race your opponents to build crossword grids. The titles come in a cute banana shaped travel bag make it portable and a great stocking stuffer. This version is great for players 7 years old and up.

The My First Bananagrams uses lowercase letters and combo tiles which are simply common letter combinations to help younger kids. Other game options are included with My First Bananagrams to encourage reading and spelling skills. This version is great for kids 4 and older.

The Big Letter Bananagrams is the same as the Classic version except that the letter tiles are larger for someone who might have visual challenges.

First 100 Words Game

The First 100 Words was a favorite book at our house for a very long time so I was really excited to see the First 100 Words Activity Game. This game will be gifted to a few nieces and nephews this year. In this game, vibrant picture cards are placed around the room and then the child rolls a soft dice and finds a card that matches the color on the dice or the category. This game is great for vocabulary building and encourages simple counting.

I Spy Preschool Game

This game takes riddles and photographs from the popular I Spy book series and requires players to match riddles with pictures. Only the correct matches will interlock together making sure that your child matches the correct riddles and images. The I Spy Preschool Game is a fun way to promote reading.

Heads Talk Tails Walk

This hilarious game from ThinkFun is great for kids ages 3 and up. The game includes 10 large tiles that have an animal’s body printed on it and 10 smaller tiles that have an animal’s head printed on it. Players try to match the heads and tails. When a player chooses a head and a body they make the sound and movement of whatever they create. In this game, you may be clucking like a chicken while moving like a monkey. Kids love the movement (and silliness) involved in this game!

Blank Slate

This game is a super fun family game that requires you to think about what other players are thinking. Each player writes a word on ththat completes a phrase on a card. If your word matches another player’s word, you both gets points. This is a quick and easy game for players 8 years old and up. Blank Slate comes with 8 individual slates to write on, dry-erase markers and 250 double-sided word cue cards.

Upwords

Upwords is a strategic word building game where you are rewarded by stacking words as high as possible. It is similar to scrabble but with the added challenge of building up. This high-stacking word-building game is great for players 8 years and older. The game can be played by 2-4 players.

Pictionary

This classic game is so much fun for a range of ages. This version contains two levels of clues: 120 Adult clues and 80 Junior clues). Pictionary is a quick drawing game for 2-4 players. Players sketch out the clue on the clue card and teammates try to guess. You don’t have to be an artist to play – any abilities are welcome in this entertaining game.

Slapzi

Slapzi is one of our all-time favorite games. This game is from the creators of Tenzi (another awesome game). Slapzi is a fast-paced game where you race to be the first to match one of your picture cards with the clue card. The game includes 120 unique, vibrant, double-sided picture cards and 65 clue cards. As with other games from the Tenzi creators, there are multiple ways to play. I love the vocabulary and spelling learning, as well as, the reasoning that takes place each time we play this entertaining game.