The United States of America is 250? I vaguely remember the 200th anniversary and the Bi-centennial train that made its way across the country.Brain Quest Presidents Smart Cards is released the same year as its 250th and is a surprisingly fun and engaging way to test your knowledge about the U. S. Presidents. I say ‘surprising’ because presidential facts doesn’t take up much, if any space in my wheelhouse. It’s an area that I’ve never purposely sought out information on, despite many U.S. history classes that certainly put a couple of facts in my hippocampus.
This is the updated version. One version of this was released in 2013, but the United States has added on to their President count since then. These illustrations have also been updated to show the presidents in a more realistic and less cartoonish manner. The other surprising fact about Brain Quest Presidents Smart Cards is how entertaining they are. I know, learning shouldn’t be entertaining, right? Because sarcasm is sometimes challenging to get, especially if you don’t know the author or the context, I’ll clarify that was indeed meant to be taken sarcastically. The best teachers are entertaining. It’s math with a side of comedy, English Literature with a hint of teen slang or history in bite-sized nuggets that are spread out over six different categories.
Name That Chief, Oval Office, Big Moments, Path to the Presidency, First Families and Wild Card are the six categories in the cards. They follow the same order on each card and are on two different decks in this set. The cards are connected via a very secure holder in the bottom right that allows users to turn them clockwise like a paint swatch. They’re thick cards, but still quite pliable and bend very easily to the point of being resilient, and not fragile. After every two answers there’s a dedicated card for most of the Presidents. This card, as well as, all of the text on the cards, is written at a fifth-grade level.
The questions are asked on one card, with the answers being on the next card after you turn it. Everything is color-coded with a logo assigned to each category. The questions and answers are also color-coded, so the alternating light and dark blue segments make it easy for your eyes to find answers.
All of this makes reading the questions and finding the answers very easy. This is important because children may be reluctant when it comes to Smart Cards. However, if you’re planning a trip with kids who are in fifth through 11th grade an activity like this is really helpful on those car trips. We have a family activity like this one, but it’s the computer version of Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?. Cards like these don’t require a power source and can be just as entertaining.
It’ll add a little punch in those road trips when you’re three hours into a five-hour car ride. The winner can pick the lunch place. The loser gets their phone taken away for 30 minutes. The rewards for the winners can vary, but help add a little zip to the trip and make the audience a little smarter also. The format of the cards lends itself to any topic matter. As the Brain Quest Presidents Smart Cards stand now, they’re mainly meant for elementary school kids. There are three editions that anyone can enjoy, with the rest of them specifically geared towards kindergarten or one of the grades in elementary school. But as Jeff Foxworthy taught us, there are countless questions ant topics that even fifth graders know more than their parents or older siblings.
Unexpectedly, the cards and facts in Brain Quest Presidents Smart Cards are completely apolitical. Readers won’t know if William Henry Harrison was a democrat or a republican. Was James Madison a republican? I don’t know, and these cards don’t tell you. But I do know that he was the “Father of the Constitution”and spent much of his second term making the banking and military systems stronger.
Brain Quest Presidents Smart Cards is geared for fifth grade and up and is available by Workman Publishing.
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