Keep your kids engaged and cultivate the habit of reading with these activity boxes

A crate experienceTo remind children that people may forget facts but remember stories founder Sonika D established Junior Crate a book subscription platform which helps expose young minds to new ideas through an immersive reading experience ldquoThe idea is to create a spark of recognition and inspire purposeful conversations while strengthening a childrsquos vocabulary comprehension empathy and other skillsrdquo she saysA kid plays with the boxBased in Goa and launched in August the platform offers four agebased categories of boxes mdash from Sprout for ages zero to two to Bloom for ages six to eight Each month presents a new theme with tales and activities that are curated around it to help young readers relate to stories and closely examine their themes characters and other literary elementsTitles like Sudha Murtyrsquos How The Mango Got Its Magic Janaki Sabesh and Dhwani Sabeshrsquos Paatirsquos Rasam and Pankaja Srinivasanrsquos The Chase Of The Stolen Smells have made it to the curation so far Novemberrsquos theme is about all things food The activities include material for making pretend food worksheets a cloth cutlery pouch and other goodiesWhat started with helping parents with ageappropriate book recommendations and bookish activities to keep young readers entertained led to the concept of Junior Crate which cuts out the process of having to research classic tales and new releases and create ways to engage children in readingSonika DOne of the aims behind the subscription approach is to offer children something curated especially for them to have something to look forward to every month and in the process build a home library The platform is in the midst of curating holidaythemed boxes for December which will release soonLog on to juniorcrateinCost Rs 1349 onwardsOnce upon a timeReading as a child is an adventure in creating cherished memories For Reshma Poojary having books bought by her father and reading them together with her mother was a tradition that she wanted to carry on with her son ldquoWhen you sit with a child to tell them stories it stays with them the purpose of parental bonding is the reason I founded Lotus Flute in June 2022rdquo she sharesA child tries his hand at the activitiesThe Mumbaibased platform creates craft boxes to go with story cards building a world of tales and activities where children from the age of two onwards and their parents can play with stories to help young ones engage with them The cards can be read by parents or grandparents who can infuse personal stories songs and experiences in their own mother languageThe Punyakotithemed boxThe boxes include painting and craft activities that interweave elements from the story to help children connect with characters reinforce lessons and understand new perspectives For instance The Lion and Mouse box includes material to recreate the characters stimulating onersquos imagination a wooden frame and thread to make a net and help develop fine motor skills A special addition is the set of affirmation cards that read lsquoI am braversquo or lsquoI am safersquo which can be painted and kept on a mini easelThe boxes are categorised as moral tales folk tales and untold epics The Punyakoti box comprises the story of the honest cow based on a folk song from Karnataka wooden cutouts of the character with stickers and paintReshma PoojaryPoojary shares that with the folk boxes she aims to bring stories from across India to children in an easy manner so that they can develop better associations with different Indian cultures Untold epic boxes highlight various smaller stories rich with insight from the Mahabharata and Ramayana Look out for their upcoming December boxLog on to lotusflutecomCost Rs 750 onwards