Space Race

'Space Race' is a key stage 2 board game by Oaka books, focussing on physics, following the national curriculum closely.

In order to appreciate why this game is different, it's important to look at what makes Oaka books unique. The idea behind Oaka books is that the resources are designed with focus on visual learners and Oaka books ensures areas such as dyslexia are not ignored.

'Oaka’s aim is to make curriculum based topics easy for everyone with their fantastic range of visual learning guides. All of the packs are curriculum based and with the colourful, fully illustrated and clearly laid out designs they are ideal for visual learners. They include memory maps, glossaries of key words and terms, as well as Oaka Active Learning Maps (with character cards) or Games (with flashcards). We have over 47 Oaka topic packs and revision guides for children at KS3/CE level helping them to understand key topics for a range of subjects from Science and French to Geography and History...'

We have previously purchased Oaka books, but I was excited to see new board games available for key stage 2, and knew it would be worth the money!

Space Race

Space Race is a board game, focussing on the syllable (physics) and closely linked to the national curriculum. 

The aim of this game is to collect as many asteroids and stars and to rescue the stranded astronaut. The general layout of the board (with a few additions) is very similar to the classical game of snakes and ladders, however on this board, lading on a rocket means moving upon and landing on a comet means moving back down. 

Alongside the board for the game, dice and plastic playing pieces, there are question cards, facts cards and points cards. There are two sets of points cards, an asteroid (5 points) and star cards (10 points). 

The game flows as a board game, each player rolling the dice and the one with the highest number starting the game. As mentioned above, the game follows a similar pattern to snakes and ladders, but with the addition of question spaces and planet spaces. The question cards come in two colours, lighter purple and darker purple. The lighter cards are lower key stage 2 questions with the darker cards with questions more so for higher key stage 2. The question cards are printed with the question on one side and either an asteroid or star on the other (placed with questions facing down). When a player lands on the question space, another player selects a question card, if the question is correct the player can continue to move (on next turn), if the answer is incorrect the player must answer another question on their next turn and so on. Getting a question right means you earn the reward card, so if the question card was a star, the player receives the 5 point star card. 

There are also spaces on the board known as the planet spaces. If a player lands on the planet spot, he/she picks the information card for the planet and reads the factual information included. 

The game ensures the curriculum is covered extensively, and the following topics are included:

1. Earth, Sun and moon
2. Electrical circuits 
3. Electrical conductors
4. Forces
5. Friction
6. Light
7. Magnets
8. Shadows
9. Sound

The game doesn't end with the first person to reach the astronaut, but each player needs to add points and the one with the highest points wins.

a question card, showing the style of questions and answers. 

What we think

Little person has always been more of a visual learner, therefore finding resources that are aimed at visual learners is brilliant. 

Learning through play is vital for children, and this game ensures the players are both having a lot of fun as well as learning. The question cards are both great for revision as well as learning new concepts. Little person thoroughly enjoyed the game, and didn't mind the fact that he was actively learning whilst playing. 

The game enabled me to 'assess' little person, and note areas that needed more work and areas he was confident with. 

We thoroughly enjoy this game, and I do feel this has helped me too with 'teaching' physics. The fact that the national curriculum is followed so closely is a huge positive, and it's wonderful to know that whilst relaxing and playing, we are also learning and achieving! 

This has become a teaching tool as well as a fun tool, and our science sessions are certainly more fun now. As the game provides so much teaching material I have incorporated it within our schooling, and one can imagine how much little person is enjoying that. Children definitely need to be taught using a variety of resources, and cannot be expected to use only workbooks. 

I think it's important to note the quality of this product. Sometimes, we pay for resources/games and feel disappointed with the quality. However, I can happily assure you, the game is of the highest quality, to the point that I cannot imagine the contents box ever getting damaged either. 

I would give this game a huge 10/10, and because we are so happy with this game, we will be purchasing the others available too! 

For more information, check website here.