Thoughts on the Leapster 2 for 5 Year Old?

[stephanie2377]

We plan on getting our 4yo a Leapster 2 for Christmas. He has been dying for a handheld game! He has a My First Leapster, but has completely outgrown it.

Can you all list your child's favorite games? I know about PetPals and Cars, but that is about it. I'd love to hear what you all love the most.

Does the Leapster 2 come with a rechargeable battery pack? Do you all have a carry case?

I am trying to think early on this!
Thanks
Stephanie

[mommylamb]

What's the difference between regular leapster and leapster 2?

[mykidsmom]

Is the battery pack the same as the charging station?

[Percycat]

My 5 y/o still likes her leapster (reg, not L2), but if I were buying her something now, I would look at the Nintendo DS (better for older kids, not "babyish", more games). Leapster also makes something called the Didj which I am not really familiar with but it might be worth looking into.

Son(6) received a digi last year from grandparents for Christmas. Son is not excessively interested in video games, but he does enjoy the digi. Although the game selection is limited, compared to the DS, it is more than sufficient for our needs. The games are educational, interspersed with typical video game. For instance, the one of Son's games (sonic?) has a game that seems similar to mario brother type game and once a level is reached, it will have some type of spelling activity/game. These games alternate. My Son really likes this. Another feature of the digi is the ability to customize the games. Bad parents that we are, we just learned how to customize the digi this past weekend. Son had mastered all of the spelling words that were programmed with his game, but we were able to go online and identify new words (from suggested lists or our own lists) and update his game system. We also updated his math games to a higher "grade level". We can track his learning progress by 'sinking' the digi with our computer. We have a couple math games and a couple word games. I saw on the leapfrog website that there are some new games incorporating additional English language skills and science.

My Son is advanced academically and really enjoys math, reading, spelling.... My daughter (4.5) is learning at a more typical rate and would not be able to play any of the games we own for the digi. She also probably doesn't have the fine motor skills at this point to operate the controls, although I expect these might quickly improve with practice.

One interesting feature of the DS is the ability for kids to play with/against each other. We saw unrelated kids meet on an airplane and play with their DS. So, in some ways the DS can be a social game

[MMEand1]

My 6yo got a Leapster 2 at the end of K as a way to keep him interested in continuing to work on math during the summer. He loves it and we have purchased more games that help him with other aspects of school. We recently bought my 4yo DD one and in the space of 4 days we had to replace the batteries twice in each of theirs (it's time for the rechargeable battery packs!). They LOVE them and enjoy learning new things. My DD was so excited that she said "Mom, my leapster is making me learn!"

I certainly do not think that 5 years old is too old for a leapster as long as you have a few games that he can change out. There are a lot of games that the kids can play that makes learning fun!