Imagination is a vulnerable and powerful part of being a child and one of the best ways to strengthen it is through storytelling. No pictures. No video. Simply words. But in a time when our lives revolve largely around screens, escaping them takes a lot of effort. So it's refreshing to see the company Lunii create My Fabulous Storyteller, a small speaker filled with short audio stories for kids.
I came across My Fabulous Storyteller inside an exhibition hall at the Mandalay Bay hotel during CES 2019. I spotted the tiny bright teal-colored speaker on a table. It looked as if someone had drawn a picture of an old radio with markers, then brought it to life.
My Fabulous Storyteller doesn't have Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant on it. Instead, it's filled with short stories aimed at kids ages 3 to 8.
With My Fabulous Storyteller, kids craft stories in a Mad Libs kind of way, choosing the hero, the setting, another character and an object. Then one of 48 stories with those elements plays. Each story is between 3 and 7 minutes long and you can download hundreds of other stories online. All stories are available in eight languages including English, French, German, Italian and Spanish.
It is truly refreshing to see such a simple and well-thought out device. Sadly there weren't any children at the Mandalay Bay casino to test the speaker out, but it's pretty clear that My Fabulous Storyteller can be a wonderful way to entertain and help your children develop.
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Lunii's My Fabulous Storyteller costs $70 which converts roughly to £55 or AU$100.
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