Monday 19 December 2011

Bugs Observation Dome by Asco Educational

I was fortunate enough to be sent out a bugs observation dome by Asco Educational to do a review on on behalf of Izziwizzikids.co.uk. The item sells for £10.55 (+VAT).

The item is a smallish clear plastic dome, with the base about the size of an average tea plate and stands 6 inches tall to the top of the dome, and 8 inches to the top of the observation tube.

Now we have got this item in the middle of December and we could not find any bugs under the bark or the stones in the garden, so as the item is just intended to magnify whatever you put in we rounded up a few strange objects to see the detail in them. One of Bob and granddads favourite pastimes in the summer is bug hunting so this will come into its own then.

We used a piece of hairy knitting wool, was the nearest thing I could find to a beastie with hairs on its legs that we could magnify. We also looked at a 1p piece, which Fifi thought the portcullis looked like a waffle, a 2p piece, a piece of onion skin, a piece of carrot skin, and a frond of a cacti plant we have ( a none prickly type).

The door to the dome was a good size and Bob, who is a small 5, managed to get his hand right into the dome, and it measured 4 inches tall, more than half the height of the dome. It has a handle on to allow for easy sliding up and down making it easy to pop the beasties in and encloses them so they cant escape. The downside of this being there are no air holes on the item and therefore if you forgot about the beastie he may suffocate.

The item did not come with any tools to either pick up beasties with or anything to keep/carry them in until you are ready for them.

Once your beasties ( or pieces of hairy wool) was inside the dome it could wander anywhere and still be seen as the observation tube rotates through the full 360 degrees, and it is height adjustable, goes right up to the top of the dome, and goes right back to ground level, and the grandkids thought it was hilariously funny that if they bashed it down hard and quick they could squash the beasties with the tube - thankfully we only squashed inanimate objects.

I felt the item would have benefited  from a light up base as time the child leant over the dome to look into the tube they were obscuring a lot of the light.

Fifi felt the item wasn't overly exciting, but feels it will be more fun with proper beasties. I would say the item is suitable for 5-9 yrs old, any younger than that and they probably not able to grasp the concept of using one eye to look, any older and the will not find it interesting at all.

Here is a video of our findings.



This item was supplied to me for the purpose of this review, but the findings are an honest reflection of what we found

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