Game: Apples to Apples Kids

Thread: Re: A fantastic addition to your child's game library

wyldeoak — 2008-06-21T11:23:53+00:00

On the variant of throwing in cards from the deck:

I read somewhere someone (sorry I can't give proper credit) plays with a stuffed animal and it is the stuffed animal's card that is added from the deck. Fun to see if the stuffed animal wins.

Thread: Poll: Children's Ratings

Randy Cox — 2008-06-20T19:54:51+00:00

[poll=9648]

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swuyau — 2008-05-27T15:07:54+00:00

New box

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droberts441 — 2008-03-24T19:35:44+00:00

New Box Front (Kids/Not Junior)/Upright for wiki page

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Steerpike.Instance — 2008-03-13T21:44:25+00:00

The "Kids" box (as opposed to Junior)

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atimrogers — 2007-12-25T15:46:44+00:00

Vertical box

Thread: Re: A fantastic addition to your child's game library

ced1106 — 2006-07-21T06:24:41+00:00

Another three-player variant is to toss in two random cards from the deck -- and keep score for the deck. Amusingly enough, it sometimes wins.

Another point for Jr. is that the adult version has references to people and events that may no longer be current several years from now.

Thanks for the review!

aka. Washu! ^O^

Thread: Re: A fantastic addition to your child's game library

TheCat — 2006-07-20T21:29:04+00:00

We often play with three -- two adults and one child. Our modification is to have each person submit two cards instead of one, so there are four cards for the judge to evaluate.

Thread: Re: A fantastic addition to your child's game library

steveoliverc — 2006-07-20T17:47:33+00:00

Great review, Melissa!

I'm in complete agreement about how well this game goes over with kids. One group at my game club who had played it a lot would play it almost as if it was a game of Pit because they would shout out their word to the judge and try to get theirs picked. They love the game.

Good point about the age differences. It can work, but it helps to ask the older kids to offer help to the younger kids.

Thread: A fantastic addition to your child's game library

melissa — 2006-07-20T10:08:53+00:00

Apples to Apples Junior is a terrific word game for children who are beginning to explore reading.

The rules are simple, and exactly the same as the adult version. Before play starts, each player is dealt a hand of five cards with red apples on their backs. Players take it in turns to be the Judge, moving clockwise around the table.

Each round, the Judge draws a card with a green apple on its back from the handy plastic card tray provided, then plays the card face up in the centre of the table. Green apple cards show adjectives (or describing words, as your children probably call them) - stinky, small, purple, disgusting. Players then select a card from their hand (nouns, or things and ideas) that they think is described by the faced adjective - my grandad, the refrigerator, apple pie, school - and play it face down in the centre of the table.

Now it is the Judge's turn - she looks at all the red (noun) cards played and chooses the one that she thinks best matches the green (adjective) card. Players may try to influence that decision. The player who played the chosen card places the green card in front of them; the winner is the first player to score four green cards.

From the day we brought the (adult) Apples to Apples apple crate home, our daughter wanted to play it with us, so finding the Junior edition was a priority. It's nicely produced, with plenty of reasonably sturdy cards for great variety in your games. The card trays are a nice touch, and I understand that inkjet/laser printable DIY cards are available as an extra if you want to add your own words to the set. There is some room in the trays for this.

The choice of words is very appropriate for the 7+ age group - although possibly more so for slightly older children. We've noticed that some of our daughter's friends have some difficulty with the longer words. There is an american bias to the cards - most seven year olds in Australia have never heard of George Washington or Johnny Appleseed - but it's relatively easy to scan through the decks and remove the trickier examples. As in the adult edition, many of the cards have hints or alternate terms to help the reader deduce the meaning of unfamiliar words.

We've played this game at home with three, but it really needs more to shine. There's little downtime, so children are kept engaged throughout the game, and a couple of very funny answers will usually appear each round. As with any party game, it can get pretty noisy pretty quickly, so you may need to keep a close eye on the game if control is important to you. We have played with ten year olds as well as younger children, and the game holds its appeal well for them - a 9+ version is also available, but for younger children this version is more than adequate.

One potential issue that I see is that children may be tempted to lie about which card they played to try to force a win. This hasn't been an issue when we have played, but it could cause problems with children who are poor losers or who become too invested in winning, or with more disruptive groups. We do find that adult supervision is generally needed when playing with groups of children at the younger end of the age spectrum. The game is generally unsuitable for groups with widely varying reading abilities, unless players mentor one another.

For those who prefer non-competitive games, some simple rules adaptations are easy to find - for example, each player plays a card and then tells a story explaining why that card was an appropriate choice.

Apples to Apples Junior would also be an appropriate choice for English language classes, whether for children, for teenagers or even for adults.

I highly recommend Apples to Apples Junior for families, schools and other children's programs, for children aged from seven to at least ten or eleven. Its relatively low cost and high portability (you can always leave the box and card tray and just take the decks of cards with you) make it a fantastic addition to your child's growing game library, as well as a very appropriate gift for budding gamers.

Thread: Played with the WHOLE family

angelotti — 2005-09-12T01:19:28+00:00

Played with the whole family: me, my wife, and children (4, 7, and 10).

Ok, I know what you are thinking - a 4 year old? Well - that was probably the funniest part of the game. She would basically randomly choose a card to play. Made for some really entertaining choices.

My 7 year old, with some reading help from Mom, won. Her cards: stinky, spooky, short, and happy.

Oh - as for the rest of us. Everyone got one card except for me. Yes, even the 4 year old did better than I with a random draw. Yep - probably overthinking it.

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EJKemp — 2005-03-18T21:36:26+00:00

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EJKemp — 2005-03-18T21:36:26+00:00

Thread: Re:User Review

steveoliverc — 2005-01-05T04:53:29+00:00

PieMan (#74381),
You're right about the reading requirement, and that with the right age group this is a really fun game. I also think it's a very good game for learning about being a good sport, since each player gets judged, but then gets the chance to be the judge as well. The group dynamics can be very "self-correcting" if any of the kids are having a tough time remembering how to be a good sport, so I give this game a lot of kudos not only for being fun, but for teaching kids to be good sports at any games that they play.

Thread: User Review

PieMan — 2005-01-04T21:32:26+00:00

This game is the same as the base Apples to Apples game, except with simpler vocabulary, and the removal of the rule about getting your match in quickly so as not to be last. Oh, and each card says 'Junior' on it.

But if you haven't Apples to Apples, here's the basics.

Each round, 1 player is the judge and turns over a GREEN card containing (usually) a single word. For example, "fuzzy". Every other player then picks one of the 5 possible answers from their own RED cards, and puts it face-down in the middle of the table. After everyone has submitted ONE choice, the judge shuffles then up and reads them all out loud. People can lobby for an answer, or discuss them a bit, but eventually, it's up to the judge to pick one that they think most-closely matches the GREEN card word.

Usually, at least one of the answers will be quite funny. At any rate, it's a quick game, and usually quite fun.

The cards are fairly numerous (guesstimating at 175 RED ones and 80 GREEN ones), and can be mixed and matched in enough ways to keep this interesting for a good while.

But my one wish is that for this 'Junior' edition, the cards would've had some interesting pictures on them to match the word(s). As they instead REQUIRE the ability to read, it's a little challenging for a number of 7-year-olds. Also, pictures mean so much to children at that age; why not use that? Instead, every card just has the same boring apple picture on it (either RED or GREEN, but that's the ONLY difference).

So, just be warned that if reading skill isn't there yet, that this game won't work. For example, our 5-year-old (closing on 6) still can't read consistently, and therefore finds this a bit too challenging to play with the 8-year-old sister.

Otherwise, this is an EXCELLENT game that children of the age 7-10 bracket can easily play with their friends too. Even their parents/family will enjoy this one!

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belial1134 — 2004-12-05T14:35:03+00:00

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Bill Martinson — 2002-12-29T06:33:29+00:00

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Bill Martinson — 2002-12-29T06:33:22+00:00