Another kid’s device we have that we’ve gotten tons and tons of use out of is the Toniebox. It’s this soft padded box with a speaker on it (or plug in headphones). You place a character on it (a “Tonie”) and it plays the audio associated with that Tonie. It basically tells stories.
We heard about it from another family where the kid referred to it as “listening to their podcasts”.
She listens to various Tonies almost every day with breakfast. She listens to them with friends. Anytime, really, except we don’t let them leave the house usually. They are cool little action figures, but they are like $18 USD so it’s not the kind of thing you wanna lose.
There are a ton of different kinds of them, ranging from popular movies to science-based ones that just blast science information at ya, to music. This pride Tonie, Ms. Rainbow, is awesome. Sometimes it seems like she is lost in thought and imagination while listening, rather than the blank stare of TV watching.
Our kids have gone to bed with a Tonie on every night for the past 3 years. These things are great and I feel like they’ve both learned a ton from them.
We purchased a Yoto (per your recommendation) and love it!
The Tonie miniatures seem like they would be harder to lose than the cards.
You’ve got great taste — keep the recs coming :)
Our 5 year old is a big fan, though we’ve been a Yoto family for much longer than Toniebox. I find the UX of the Yotos much better (like, you don’t have to loudly slap it to skip tracks), but the selection of popular characters/brands for Tonies is wider, so between them he (and soon his little brother) have a crazy amount of good listenin’ options. It’s also allowed us to drastically reduce his screen time, which has had so many positive effects.