I received these products for my review. All opinions are my own.

For nearly 20 years, Silver Dolphin Books has published award-winning activity, novelty, and educational nonfiction books for preschoolers to 12-year-olds. Our focus is to create books that engage and inspire children to learn more about the world around them while fostering a love of reading, exploration, and creative expression. From adorably-illustrated board books for toddlers, to interactive play and building sets, to sound books made for story time, we develop innovative books that both enlighten and entertain.

How many rings are there around Saturn? What causes an earthquake? How many bones are in a giraffe’s neck? WithSmithsonian Everything You Need to Know: Grades 2-3, kids ages 7-9 will learn exciting and interesting facts about Earth and space, plants and animals, geography, history, and health. Each of the 275 fact cards includes colorful photos and illustrations coupled with a fascinating fact. From the solar system to George Washington to volcanoes, each fact card presents educational material in an innovative and engaging format. Inquisitive kids will have hours of fun discovering everything their young minds need to know in this interest-packed fact card set.

What is the fastest creature in the world? How do animals communicate? What is the difference between monkeys and apes? Learn the answers to these questions and more in Smithsonian Sticker Creations: Wildlife. This fun and innovative format includes a 64-page activity book, 5 oversized dimensional stickers, and more than 175 reusable stickers. After reading about their favorite wild animals, kids can pull out the removable frame to create their own animal scene with the deluxe stickers and reusable paper stickers. With interesting information and a new activity on each page, aspiring zoologists will discover the fascinating world of animals in this hands-on adventure.

Developed in collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution and esteemed childhood literacy expert Dr. Adria Klein, the Smithsonian Readers series is designed to encourage reading comprehension with high-interest topics and build reading skills with a carefully designed leveling structure. Level 1 focuses on familiar content and simple text to promote engagement and success for new readers. Smithsonian Readers: Early Adventures Level 1 contains six 32-page topics for beginning readers: Vehicles, Reptiles, Outer Space, Animal Habitats, Insects, and Safari Animals. The fascinating content is accompanied 36 perforated fact cards to further encourage early adventures in reading.

Level 1: Early Readers
-Basic factual texts with familiar themes and content
-Concepts in text are reinforced by photos
-Includes glossary to reinforce reading comprehension
-Phonic regularity
-Simple sentence structure and repeated sentence patterns
-Easy vocabulary familiar to kindergarteners and first graders

Seriously Amazing Level 2 contains six 32-page topics, chosen for their appeal to developing readers: Nighttime Animals, Sea Life, Dinosaurs, Solar System, Baby Animals, and the Human Body. Thirty-six perforated fact cards extend the learning and reading practice.

Level 2: Developing Readers
-Simple factual texts with mostly familiar themes and content
-Concepts in text are supported by images
-Includes glossary to reinforce reading comprehension
-Repetition of basic sentence structure with variation of placement of subjects, verbs, and adjectives
-Mostly easy vocabulary familiar to kindergarteners and first graders
-Introduction to new phonic structures
-Integration of contractions, possessives, compound sentences, and some three-syllable words

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World of Wonder Level 3 contains six 32-page topics for engaged readers looking to learn more about the world around them: Ancient Egypt, Wild Weather, Rain Forest Animals, The United States, The Planet, and Sharks. Children can also practice their reading skills and share their newfound knowledge with the included 36 topical fact cards.

Level 3: Engaged Readers
-Interesting factual and informational text that contains new and unfamiliar content
-Includes glossary to reinforce reading comprehension
-Repetition of longer sentence patterns with variation of placement of subjects, verbs, and adjectives
-Most of the vocabulary should be familiar to first graders
-Introduction of more complex spelling patterns and letter-sound relationships
-Photos, illustrations, and diagrams are included for further concept exploration

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Smithsonian Readers: Endless Explorations Level 4contains six 32-page topics for children on their way to becoming expert readers: Predators, Space Exploration, Natural Disasters, World Wonders, Ocean Habitats, and Flight. Bound into the book are 36 perforated fact cards created for fluent readers looking for extra learning opportunities.

Level 4: Fluent Readers
-Variety of factual texts that contain unfamiliar themes and challenging technical content
-Includes glossary and pronunciation guides to
-Contains longer and more complex sentence patterns
-Most of the vocabulary should be familiar to second-graders
-Longer stretches of text and extended descriptions without the support of pictures
-Extended sentences with various structures

Which planet is eight times larger than Earth? How long is a day on Venus? Which planet has seven rings? Kids will learn all of these answers and more in Smithsonian Magnetic Adventures: Solar System. After reading the 64-page book, kids can decorate the magnetic tin’s printed photographic interior with the included 30 foam magnets and 20 reusable clings. The interior features two unique scenes for use with the magnets and reusable clings: a moonscape so kids can create their own lunar landing scene, and an activity where kids can place the planets in the correct order. Starting at the Sun and journeying beyond Neptune, young adventurers will be inspired to blast off into outer space with Smithsonian Magnetic Adventures: Solar System.

Anytime fun and education mix, our family is on board. I knew anything from Silver Dolphin Books and the Smithsonian were going to be both of those things, but I had no idea how much we were going to love our new books, magnet sets, information cards, and sticker books!

We have honestly totally dove into and loved everything. They are all extremely engaging for kids and keep their interest. I would have to say our favorite have been the books, though. My boys LOVE them! They are in Kindergarten and 1st grade so they have started reading, and I LOVE the different levels of these books! It makes it perfect for them to read some on their own and for us to read some together. Each chapter has a little quiz at the end, and we have made it into such a fun time together at night reading and learning new information. The books also have fact cards which of course my boys love! There is so much to learn and Silver Dolphin Books have made that learning super fun.

They really love this “Everything You Need to Know” cards too- I love that they are just small chunks of information that they can read or we can read together, and it doesn’t have to be a long thing. We’ve already used them for school projects too! Great wealth of information made interesting with pictures and the most important facts.

And how cute is this solar system set? Kids love to learn about planets, and this is a set they’ll be playing with over and over again.

Any of these products would make the perfect gift for anyone on your list- parents love anything that keeps their child’s minds active and kids love the bright colors, pictures, and fun information!