Thursday 12 August 2010

summer afternoon fun (inside) and a little lesson on consumerism


When it is too humid to be outside in the middle of the day, we find fun inside...for Celeste that usually means dressing up, lugging around countless bags, or playing librarian.

For Adrienne and Andre, when they are not busy creating movies, they can be found playing with these little guys. This summer, they discovered and bought for themselves some Gogos. These were available at our local educational store. I am not quite sure what is educational about them, but they have spent hours playing all kinds of different games with these little guys.


The game they were playing while I took these quick shots was a type of battle game. They would flick one gogo and try to topple the other player's gogos with it.


I think there are over 80 designs of Gogos and each design comes in 5 different colours.
Discovering the collecting aspect of this new toy lead to an interesting talk about consumerism with my children, especially my older two.
We talked about how companies create these collections to make you want to buy more of their products to complete your collection. You can't choose which gogos you buy either, because they don't come in a see-through package. It is fun to have a surprise, but if you are trying to get a particular one, you could end up buying a lot before you get it. We also talked about how they labelled some gogos "most wanted" and "wanted". These labels make you think that those particular ones are super special and you should try to get one, which leads you to buy more! 
Adrienne and Andre understand that companies are in business to make money, but I think it was important to point out how they go about it. 
They spent their own money on these, so I know they will think twice before buying more. 

3 comments:

  1. Interesting, Gogos, eh? Never heard of em. But, interesting and what a great way to talk about consumerism.

    Celeste reminds me of Zoe in that picture. LOL!

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  2. Huh. Cute toys. I've never seen or heard of them. Your kids made up some fun little games.

    That's a great Real Life lesson!
    We've been talking about consumerism lately over here, too. There's always more going on than people realize. Those companies study, manipulate, coerce, and direct us in hundreds of ways.
    The stuff begins to own the owners. Important for kids to learn at a young age!

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  3. I too think it's such a valuable lesson to understand! We talked about the with the apples Jacob wanted to buy today LOL They were Red Delicious apples and they were ready and very 'shiny'. They really caught his eye, until I said to him food is no different than toys or other articles businesses are trying to sell. I had to explain to him that the apples are waxed prior to coming to the grocery store so that you take notice and want to buy them.

    We talk a lot about consumerism, but I don't think he realized how far it went. The apple really stretched his mind on the subject LOL

    Such a valuable lesson these days!! They are very cute :)

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