Kids spend around six hours of their day at school. Some even come home with homework and spend more time learning. That is all good and kids should be encouraged to learn as much as possible, especially as their brains are like sponges. However, you don’t want to overload them and want them to play and have fun when at home. But why does playing and having fun mean that they can’t still be learning at the same time. We love educational toys and games in our house, especially ones everyone can join in with and where the kids can learn something new without knowing it. Understanding electronics is a vital part of children’s scientific education but this set teaches more than that. It also helps with problem solving, critical and logic thinking when something doesn’t work as it should – where did we go wrong and what can we do to fix it. It also teaches patience, being meticulous, how to read and follow diagrams and instructions, and having a clear thought process.

Type of Products: John Adams Toys produces a wide variety of toys for children, including board games, puzzles, outdoor games, and creative arts and crafts sets. Some of their most popular products include "Hot Wires" game, "Edible Science" game, and "Aquagelz" craft sets. The next thing to consider when choosing toys for children is what do we want them to learn? Do we want them to learn about animals? About colors? About counting? These are all important topics that you may want your child exposed to from an early age so that they can begin learning about these things before school starts and continue learning throughout the year. Educational toys play a big role in this, as they keep on introducing and nurturing children with educational topics, their surroundings, life skills and many more. The entire set is just quality. The components feel tough and durable, and are not flimsy so will stand up to being snapped together and unsnapped for a long time. Contents: transparent assembly workstation, connectors, buzzer, touch plate, photo resistor, LEDs, battery units, loudspeaker, music IC, alarm IC, sound IC, motor unit, propellor, antenna coil, lamp, bulb, microphone, power amp IC, resistors, capacitors, transistors, diode and full colour instruction booklet. Requires 4 x AA batteries (not included) John AdamsThe Hot Wires kit states that it is suitable for children 8+ but our six-year-old daughter Ella has been perfectly capable of putting together experiments 1-15 so far and judging by her enthusiasm she’ll be building the logic circuits (experiments 96-100) in no time. Definitely worth 5 stars for ease of use, quality, durability, educational and fun value. Hot Wires is education in a fun, practical way that encourages creative & logical thinking and helps children read and follow instructional electrical diagrams. If you want to help further your children’s education at home then Hot Wires is the perfect set to encourage their scientific learning. Who knows, you may just find that you have a budding electrical engineer in the house.

Which is why I was so keen to get my hands on the John Adams Hot Wires set, which looked like everything his online lessons weren’t; fun, exciting, colourful, inspiring. Basically, everything that good teaching should be. And my suspicions that this might finally provoke an interest in him were well founded. The experiments in the book are really fun and do encourage children to learn in a fun way. With making Morse Code generators, simple radio sets, flashing lamps etc. there is a lot to do and enjoy. I have loved helping the kids with the experiments and, I must admit, to doing a few whilst they haven’t been around (it is quite interesting and you’re never too old to learn). The youngest member in the house (age 8) has even made her own designs, blowing a fuse along the way but creating some interesting and working designs! Both my children were very keen to try out the experiments! It didn’t take Ms C long to find the components and Mr K to set it all up. For example, if you are buying a toy for a toddler that is too advanced, they may get bored and turn to other activities while they wait for the toy to be played with. Thus, early learning toys are appropriate for toddlers, instead of too complex toys. We first built the Lie Detector which involves using the Touch Plate. When people tell lies they become nervous and sweat slightly. This alters the electrical resistance of their skin. The Loudspeaker produces a low note, indicating that your skin has a high electrical resistance. If you wet your finger and touch the Touch Plate, the note produced becomes high and loud.The first experiment is Making a Simple Circuit. This is something I do remember from school – using a switch to turn on/off a small light bulb. All the components are ‘snapped’ on to a plastic board (supplied) and then the components snapped onto each other. The kids found this easy to do and followed the simple illustrated picture diagram quite easily. By building a simple circuit and using the information in the book it shows how electricity flows and how opening or closing a circuit will give a result, in this case turning on or off the light.

When you're shopping educational toys for your child, the first thing to consider is the age of the toy. Educational toys should be age appropriate, otherwise they will not be helpful in developing skills or learning concepts. Hot Wires are made with improved corrosion resistance components and the composition of new zinc. This gives the batteries a 10-year, anti-leak shelf life. The use of Japanese technology in making the product gives it better performance after storage, high temperatures, and discharge. School Project Suitable For example, if a child wants to play with cars but can't yet reach them without climbing up on furniture or standing on boxes, then consider purchasing an attachment that allows them to play with cars without having to stand up or climb up things.About the Brand: John Adams Toys is a UK-based toy company that was founded in 1967. Therefore, as of 2023, the company has been in existence for over 55 years. They are best known for their excellent game sets for arts & crafts, their science and STEM range of products which has been making learning science fun.

Next we built the radio set which involves using the Variable Capacitor and the Antenna Coil. My children finds this experiment super cool and loves that they are able to get a radio signal and listen to it but the sound is quite soft. I can’t say there have been many occasions over the last year of home schooling that I’ve genuinely looked forward to. Certainly not listening to pre-recorded lessons explaining fronted adverbials to my nine-year-old, or split diagraphs to my six-year-old. But one set of lessons I did get excited about – before they started – were the pre-recorded electronics lessons on the Oak National Academy. As we have been working our way through the book, the experiments get slowly more complicated adding in resistors of varying strengths, different types of switches and sensors and even sounds. The favourite experiment the kids have completed so far is experiment 3 where they power a spinning disc causing it to fly up in the air.The Hot Wires set is vastly different from the electronics sets that I remember. Hot Wires is all plug and play, no wires to strip or solder, just snap the components together to build your circuit. The snap together components make is so much easier for little hands to build fully working circuits independently. The Hot Wires set allows you to create circuits such as a lie detector, burglar alarm, spinning disk and plenty more. As the book continues the experiments become more than simple circuits with the addition of sound IC units for burglar alarms and lie detectors (requires moisture on a sensor) and light sensitive photo resistor. Will this kit you can even create logic circuits, introducing binary and how computers work. I am really impressed with as how you progress through the book the experiments get more challenging, adding in new components and more complicated designs. The sees circuits go from a switch to circuits activated by touch, noise, water and light giving results in sirens, flashing lights, flying discs and even sound effects.