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The My Body and Me Kiwi Crate is another duplicate for us, but Gwen wasn’t able to do this one that last time we received it. She was very happy to have this one to herself!
This crate was a surprise to me actually when we first did it. I had gotten so used to the STEM-type projects in each crate that a project that had sewing in it seemed almost out of place! The kids really seemed to enjoy it and this crate actually sparked some discussions among my kids about what functions the brain and heart perform for our bodies.
In this crate, your child will build her own stethoscope and make her own plush organs, which sounds weird but they actually turned out pretty cute! There is also one extra project to take “X-rays” that we weren’t able to do.
Putting the stethoscope together was not too difficult, but my daughter did need help with pushing the tubes all the way onto the T connectors. The stethoscope does actually work too! In fact, we still have the stethoscope from the previous box, so it has held up to some play time.
The pieces for the stethoscope
This is a really clever way to make your own stethoscope out of everyday items. I give kudos to the one who thought it up!
We were able to make three plush organs with the materials in the box: a stomach, a heart, and a brain. I almost wish there were one or two more plush organs to make, but it took a while for Gwen to make just the three we had. So maybe it was a good thing there weren’t more plush organs to make.
Gwen had issues sewing up the organs while holding the felt pieces, so I held them for her. Watching her sewing motions had the unexpected side effect of making me feel very sleepy!
Gwen’s plush organs. She put the googly eyes on without help and drew their faces.
The included body chart with the plush organs
There was also a dry erase marker and a doctor’s check-up card in the crate. I think this is a good way to help a child know what to expect when they go to the doctor. The check-up card has a lot of the same questions that a doctor would ask you at an appointment.
So even though the My Body and Me Kiwi Crate was an unusual one, it was educational for my kids and had some interesting projects in it that they enjoyed making.
-Lynn
Note: This Kiwi Crate is not currently available in the Kiwico Store.
As a bio teacher (with 2 nursing professionals in the family), I liked seeing the contents of this box. Glad your daughter had fun with it. When you have access to a craft store, pick up some pieces of coloured felt, matching yarn/big darning needle, and some bags of stuffing, and make your own plush organs. You can even buy extra googlie eyes to glue on. Use sheets of blank paper to trace over the organs on your posted as a template to use to cut out the felt and a hole punch to make holes to be able to sew through. So much fun.
I think I might have felt somewhere here. And there was still some stuffing left over from the crate materials. I think making the lungs would be interesting!
This was a really fun crate and very well-done I thought!
I was thinking the lungs, liver (with a green gall bladder tucked into one of the lobes), kidneys, small and large intestine. Probably too early to think about adding in the urinary bladder/ovaries etc. 🙂