Amino Educational Game: Tournament （Amino育智游戏)

Good morning there!

Here's introduction to another education series - Amino's Tournament cardboard game, it's an interesting game that encourages pattern recognition & positioning, observation and concentration skill in young kids. I would recommend to start this from 8 months onwards.


Note: I made a mistake in my previous post, these game sets are called Amino, not Phinken, and they were designed and printed in France. The Phinken Primar set comes with with different types of material and this particular set is called Amino. Sorry for the confusion.


It comes in the standard card box for easy storage.

Like Space Magician, you can find the instructions on the reverse of the box.

It has a base templates with 9 square boxes and over 18 different pattern templates for you to use as challenge. Get little ones to arrange the 22 geometrical shape cards into the respective boxes, according to the chosen pattern.



I shall leave it to the photos to do the explanation..


1. Here are the pattern cards and the various shape cards - consist of "X", "O", "N","Z", "L", diamond in 4 different colors. Pick any one pattern card to begin the challenge.

2. Start arranging the different shapes until you got the matching pattern. If little one is stuck, just give hints, eg tell him he needs a red X, or need to turn the N around to become a Z etc. Refrain from doing it for him coz its him who is playing and learning, not you ;)

This game has became too easy for Ethan as he has grasped a good understanding on the concept... He completed the challenge below within 1 minute.

In order to make it more challenging for him, I set a timer on my phone and both of us took turn to compete on the same pattern. Guess which was mommy's timing? (hint: mommy won, hehe)

We moved on to play a few more challenges before he proceeded to watch his Mickey Mouse clubhouse programme. At least we had 10 minutes of right brain stimulation time, better than pure TV or PS game. :)

This game may seem difficult at first but once your little one understand the concept and gain the ability to recognize patterns and position them, you'll be amazed how fast he or she progress. Just remember to give your little one positive encouragement and praise him if he gets a correct move. Please don't loose your temper if he or she got it wrong or not paying attention, just attempt again on another day. Learning is suppose to be fun and not pressuring..


For Young Infant
For younger baby, you may change the game plan slightly but still using the same materials - flash each card and read the color or shape aloud. For example, "one red X", or just "Red".

Flash max of 5 different cards each time and repeat for 2-3 rounds. No point doing too many cards or repetitions as young babies has much shorter attention span. They probably would have crawl away or try to grab the cards from your hands. Try to practice this 1 time a day with your little one, and you'll be surprised by their ability to learn.


Well, that's all about this Tournament game. Have a great day with your little ones!



Copyrights © Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones, 2012 - present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of any materials/photos within this website without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Matching Cards Game 育智游戏：找相同

When my little Captain was around 16 month old, I introduced matching pictorial cards game to him. Each day, I spent about 10 minutes doing flashcards, card games, logic games etc with him after work, followed by bedtime story. Although tired, I enjoyed the quality time spent with my little boy.

Ethan matching the shape cards by himself while mommy watched on..

About 8 weeks later, my little Captain, then 18 months old, finally grasped the logic of the matching card game and able to correctly find the pair of matching cards when I randomly laid out 3 pairs of cards in front of him. Everyone at home were so amazed by him, little did they knew that this came from constant coaching. :)

Beginner Level
Hold the stack of pictorial cards in hand, show 1 by 1 to your little one while reading the object in the card. Repeat 5 cards at a time. This will help LO to remember the object's names.

This is suitable for baby between 8 mo to 1.5 yo.

intermediate Level
Randomly lay out 3 pairs of cards in front of LO, pick up 2 matching cards and tell LO "These are the same!". Read out loud the object name and encourage LO to help you find the matching card.

You may introduce this game to LO around 1.5yo to 2.5yo. Easy as it may seen, it takes some time and effort to train LO to understand and follow instructions.

You can pick cards of similar types in nature, e.g. all red colors, all vehicles, all toys, all food etc, to teach LO the concept of same category, and eventually spot the difference.

Depending on the LO's readiness, it may takes sometimes for your LO to understand what you wanted him/her to achieve, so it is important to encourage and praise LO for successfully finding a match. Clapping, praising openly is an effective way of let LO know he/she has done a good work. Gradually increase to 5 cards and rotate different card sets when LO understand the logic of the game. I played up to 20 pairs of card with Ethan when he was 2+ years old and he was really proud of himself with each "mission completion".

Advanced Level
At 3 years old, my little boy was getting so fluent with matching card game, I decided to upgrade the game to a different level - have all the cards faced downwards, each of us take turn to flip over 2 cards at a time; if the cards match, both are yours to keep; otherwise, close the cards (return to the same spot) and continue finding next matching pair. Whoever with most matching cards in hand, wins. Started from 3 pairs of cards, I gradually upgraded him to 12 pairs of cards and more.

So, what's the purpose of playing these matching card games?

1. Understand the logic of matching, or finding the same.
2. Train LO's ability to observe and memorize.
3. Build confidence. Remember to continuously encourage and do not hesitate to praise for the effort. I firmly believe that a confident kid is a happy kid.

If you have read till this far, thanks for reading and hope you find this useful!

Copyrights © Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones, 2012 - present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of any materials/photos  within this website without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.