Speech therapists, parents and kids have enjoyed Rory’s Story Cubes for building storytelling skills as players use images on dice to trigger ideas for their tale. Inventor Rory O’Connor, who brought us Action Cubes this year as well, which depict verbs to add to his original nouns, has been listening to the special needs community and their desire for larger cubes for easier physical manipulation and visual identification. His new MAX cubes are coming out at the end of October and we should all be supporting him in his effort. I tested these cubes with kids from 5-14. Many of my kids were familiar with the original smaller cubes so were fascinated with the larger size. They loved handling, tossing and dumping them. What amazed me was that they manipulated the dice to match the action in their stories. Clearly, the larger dice stimulated story telling! Here is my full review:
How can you improve on our favorite language learning cubes, Rory’s Story Cubes? Go MAX! Now kids and adults of all abilites can learn together. Inventor Rory O’Connor has been listening to educators and parents of children with special needs for the last few years and just introduced a larger version of his 9 cube story generator allowing individuals with visual and motor challenges an easier cube to see and manipulate. Children with sensory integration issues have greater sensory input with the larger cubes as they palm the shapes, deciding on their tale. We know that when kids are more regulated, they are more available for learning. The larger dice allow younger kids to play, (the recommended age starts at 6, although I have used them with younger kids) and makes group play more successful as players can see the images better as they sit around a table. My testers from 5 to 14 loved the bigger cubes and were more hands on with them, acting out the story actions with the dice– the hand image suggested their character “made a high five,” as they clapped two dice together, “the world shook” as they wiggled their globe die, and “flowers popped up” as they raised their die. Even I was surprised at how the larger dice suggested more physical involvement in the story! All the players declared the new bigger story cubes “really cool.”
