My kids love looking at globes or even an atlas and locating where the countries are, this is something I actively encourage as geography was always my weakest subject and something I still struggle with even now.
The trouble is, globes are quite large and aren’t something you would use every day so I have always hesitated in adding one to our home, knowing it could possibly become a dust collector/novelty item.
We recently received the 2 in 1 globe from Brainstorm which is different in that it is not only a globe but by night and at the push of a button it shows the constellations of the night sky and could be used as a nightlight at the same time. Once you have turned this globe on there is no need to turn off again, it has a sensor which switches the light on when the room becomes dark displaying the constellations, this then turns off when the room becomes light again – so opening the curtains in the morning will switch off the light.
The globe requires 4 x C batteries which aren’t included but you can purchase a plug adaptor separately for it so you can have plugged in next to your bed all the time.
In the daylight the 22.8cm earth globe political boundaries and natural features such as rivers and lakes, capital cities are indicated on the globe by a star and other major cities are also detailed.
By night, you press and button on the base of the stand and it illuminates a star map which shows constellations with their Latin and common names plus key stars such as Sirius and Vega are displayed.
The globe is set at a scale of 1:55,900,000. It also come with a fact sheet included in the box telling budding geographers about the earth, constellation’s and many other interesting facts.
The kids have been really loving this and have been setting challenges for me to find the countries they name with a set amount of time, as I have said before my geography is rather rusty and poor so it’s been rather helpful for me as well as them. They are very quickly learning where different counties are, the names of the nearby lakes and the names of the seas and oceans. It’s a very lovely way for them to learn as they are able to see these places and work out how far away they are…of course they still think Australia is close to us as it doesn’t look too far on a small globe – they will realise when we finally save up enough to head over to see relatives in a few years time.
I would advise getting an adapter for this if you are going to use as a nightlight as batteries won’t last too long if on for up to 10+ hours every night.
With a retail price of £44.99 this is available from amazon and many other good retailers.
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Clare
Hi, I'm Clare (Emmy's Mummy). A former Nanny and Mother of 2 - Emmy (born February 2010) and Harry (born October 2012). We are Essex based and share our adventures and misadventures of a busy crazy life.
