Ever since I saw the advert for Goldie Blox I knew I wanted to review it. I am passionate about STEM activities for girls and encouraging girls to try different things. I was delighted when we were sent Goldie Blox and the Dunk Tank to review.
I love everything about this set. It comes with a booklet with a story to read. This is really inspiring for children (especially girls) who love to have a narrative to inspire them. It gives the whole task a real purpose. The story behind this set is that Goldie, a young engineer, needs to trick her naughty dog, Nacho, to take a bath by building a dunk tank for him when he thinks he is getting treats.
The girls couldn’t wait to get started. The pieces look really appealing. I love how they are laid out in the box. The colours are well chosen. they look lovely together and are feminine without being girly. They look fun and not intimidating. We couldn’t wait to get started.
The set comes with clear and easy to follow instructions. Other than a bit of encouragement my 8-year-old could make this completely on her own. I loved the fact she didn’t need any help and it gave her lots of confidence. I love the pictures I took of her as it shows her really thinking about what she was doing and looking for solutions to the problems on her own. This is a great toy to teach resilience and perseverance, as well as engineering skills.
When the sets are finished then you place the little dog Nacho on top and throw a ball at the target to make him fall into the dunk tank.
It looks really impressive and what a great end result. A real fairground game you can play. One with targets and water and dogs dropping from the sky.
The girls all thought it hilarious that Nacho ends up soaking wet and couldn’t wait to try it out with all their toys.
The other thing it taught the girls was collaboration. After the first go they all worked together to play the game and it was lovely to see them working out their own rules for sharing and turn taking. Something which doesn’t normally happen!
The girls also liked the little rubber ball with a fish inside which came with the set.
I will definitely be buying more Goldie Blox sets for the girls. I cannot rave about them enough. I hope they will bring out class sets to use in school as well. How amazing would it be to get girls everywhere becoming more engaged with design and engineering.
Disclaimer: We were sent the toy for the purposes of this review.