You can’t beat a musical toy. In my opinion there is no better way of interacting with your toddler than getting on the floor with them and creating some music and sound! My daughter Erin has loved music since she was tiny, and has always enjoyed instruments, rhythm and dancing!
We were lucky enough to road test the TOMY Jumbo’s Jamboree – a musical elephant that has lots of hidden delights! 🙂
Product Description
It’s party time whenever Jumbo’s Jamboree rolls into town! This clever little elephant on wheels will roll merrily along playing a happy tune, with toddlers following in his wake to get a better look at all his lively colours. But Jumbo has an extra trick up his trunk. Pull him apart into seven pieces and you have an orchestra on your hands!
His trunk is a trumpet… his matching ears rattle, there are pan pipes, a xylophone and more! Children will love discovering these hidden surprises and experimenting with music and rhythm. And when it’s time for the band to move on, there’s a matching game you can play!
Parts like the trunk and the ears clip on to colour-coded connectors, while stripes on the back help line up the remaining parts in the right sequence. Jumbo’s Jamboree develops memory (he is an elephant, after all) and helps refine motor skills as your little one works out how to piece together the different pieces for a really satisfying end result.
The tune that sounds as he rolls along and the music the children can play with the instruments all make for a journey of discovery and creativity.
See more at: http://uk.tomy.com/products/jumbos-jamboree#sthash.0QaNNsp4.dpuf
RRP – ÂŁ20.99
Our Experience:
We road tested the Jumbo Jamboree with three children aged between 9 months and 3.5 years. All of them absolutely LOVED it!
The elephant on its own is an attractive and appealing design for children. He has a friendly face, and has lots of bright colours, so all of them couldn’t wait to open it and take him out the packaging. The product does require adult help to unpackage, largely because of the amount of cable ties and plastic required to hold the product together. With pieces that all separate, there is no other way around this as otherwise pieces could go missing in the shop, however it does mean that parents will need scissors or ply cutters to remove all the bits before the children can play.
On first look, it was quite easy to see that the elephant separated into lots of different parts and individual instruments, including a trumpet, xylophone, drum, harmonica, and bell rattles. The elephant itself also plays a happy jingly tune when pushed along, with the tail banging on his drum based bottom as he moves! (Very clever!)
The youngest of the group, Immy, loved playing with the elephants ears (the bell rattles) and they were the perfect size for her little hands to grip. Nathan, the eldest, loved the elephants nose (the trumpet) – marching around the lounge playing it like he was in a circus band! Erin loved the xylophone, which she could play with the stick that holds all the pieces together.
With so many parts to play with they were all happy to play together and share. Some elements such as the harmonica Erin just couldn’t get the hang of at first, just making her own little “hoooo” noises into it, but after a few attempts, a couple of days later she finally got the swing of it and was pleased as punch that she could do it “all by herself”.
With all the elements playing at once, you can probably imagine it gets a touch on the noisy side, however you wouldn’t buy a musical toy without expecting a bit of noise! A child playing individually would be a lot quieter however! 🙂
The older children enjoyed putting all the pieces back together again, and the colours on the base of the elephant helped guide them as to the correct place to put them. A younger child would struggle to do this in my opinion, but that’s one of the product’s positives for us, the fact that it almost grows up with the child and will be fun for a number of years as their spacial awareness and understanding of colours and shapes increases.
Overall we felt that the Jumbo Jamboree was great value for money and a toy that can be shared across a variety of ages. For children who love making music and puzzles, the Jumbo Jamboree is the perfect combination!
Pros:
- Great for children of a variety of ages. The recommended age is from 12 months – we tested it with 3 children aged from 9 months to 3.5 years and all of them enjoyed playing with the individual music pieces. Great for children   with siblings to encourage playing together and sharing.
- Children will love figuring out how all the pieces come apart and slot back together
- Cute and appealing elephant character with a friendly face 🙂
- Can be played with in its entirety as a push along musical elephant or with all the individual instruments separately.
- Lots of thought gone into the set up of the Jumbo Jamboree – great how the elephants tail plays the drums and how all the instruments slot together to create the elephant shape.
- Match colours to help younger children know where to put the pieces
- No batteries required! 🙂
Cons
- Lots of packaging! Because of the nature of the elephant where all the pieces come apart, it needs a significant amount of plastic and cable ties to hold it all together, some more obvious than others! As a result, it probably took about 10 minutes for my other half to remove some of the ties holding the product together whilst a group of impatient children waited to play! This is however necessary in order to keep all pieces of the product in the box.
- Don’t expect peace and quiet for a while! 🙂 As with any musical toy it does exactly what it says it will – makes a noise!!! 🙂
You can learn more about the Jumbo Jamboree on the Tomy website here – http://uk.tomy.com/products/jumbos-jamboree
