Children’s Subscription Boxes: Are They Worth It?

What are children’s subscription boxes? Are they just boxes of toys that arrive at your doorstep every month or are they more than just that? And what do these subscription boxes offer to your child and YOU?

First of all, children’s subscription boxes are not just toys that are shipped and delivered to your home every month. The contents of these subscription boxes really depends on what you have selected for your child. So, if you decide to get your child an art-themed subscription box then the contents will follow suit the chosen theme.

Second of all, usually the contents of these boxes are carefully curated to offer the customer, which is children and parents, the best quality of tools, materials, resources, or items for children to explore and have fun with at home with their parents.

So, these children’s subscription boxes usually bring lots of benefits to parents who wish to introduce home as a secondary place of learning. It is said that educational-themed children’s subscription boxes are created to assist with parenting and contribute towards children’s learning development when they are away from school.

Recently, due to the current situation with the pandemic and lockdowns, educational subscription boxes have gained popularity among parents as these boxes are ideal to enhance children’s learning experience at home, as well as, ensuring continuous learning during school shutdowns.

Apart from that, due to the culture of working at home, parents find it difficult to monitor their children while working at the same time. Therefore, these educational boxes provide support and beneficial entertainment to their children.

Leah Stodart from Mashable said that “subscription boxes are a busy parent’s best friend” – one of the most sought after benefits of educational subscription boxes for children is that these boxes keep children away from screens, electronic devices, and gadgets which puts parents at ease when they are not able to fully monitor or supervise their children.

The contents of the subscription boxes cultivate healthy and active interests or hobbies among the children such as crafting, reading, photography, and even, cooking.

These boxes make sure that parents do not have to go the extra mile to plan for fun extracurricular activities for their children while at the same time, juggling their careers and wanting to catch up with some sleep over the weekend.

So, you can pretty much say that although these boxes are intended for children – they are undeniably created for parents too.

Due to its popularity, there are a wide range of children’s subscription boxes to choose from and like I said, it is entirely up to the parents to decide which subscription box to get for their children.

In this article, we shall take a look at the kinds of educational subscription packages that have been trending among Malaysian parents and why they’ve decided to invest in each kind of monthly boxes for their children:

Some parents would like to sharpen their children’s artistic skills as most Malaysian schools seem to place more emphasis on science and math instead of the arts. Therefore, cultivating an interest for art is something that a lot of parents try to do at home.

However, in every parent’s effort of encouraging their children’s love for the arts, they’ll find that becoming a stand in art teacher for their children at home is not as easy as most thought it would be.

Certainly it requires creativity but it also requires parents to prepare art materials and tools which will not only take up a lot of time but also a lot of money.

Therefore, these craft-themed subscription boxes are a good and easy alternative to aid in children’s artistic development. These craft boxes are also popular among parents with younger children as arts and crafts activities are great for developing young children’s fine motor skills.

It can be said that reading books is turning into a hobby of the past and the habit seems to be slowly fading among children of the 21st century.

The reality is that reading is still an essential skill that is used in our daily lives and is a crucial part of children’s learning development.

Book subscription boxes are a great way for parents to embed a love for reading among their children without having to visit the bookstore every so often. The contents of book subscription boxes usually come with an activity pack that accompanies the book.

So, these boxes don’t just offer children new books to read every month but also engages children as the reader through critical thinking and analysis of the stories within the books.

Malaysian parents adore book subscription boxes as they show that books can improve more than just children’s reading skills but also sharpen children’s creative and critical thinking. Other than that, the stories also nurture good moral values and behaviour.

Recently, more and more schools in Malaysia have shifted their emphasis on STEM which stands for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

Children of the 21st century are expected to develop complex, scientific skills such as critical thinking and problem solving at an early age.

Due to this emerging trend in the Malaysian education scene, Malaysian parents are also looking for ways to get themselves familiarized with STEM education and the skills that come along with it to make sure they are able to keep up and keep track of their children’s learning progress.

STEM and science subscription boxes are great alternatives for parents to get involved in their children’s STEM learning experiences at home. These subscription boxes such as the ALFA and Friends’ Spark kit are a fantastic way to pique children’s interest and improve their understanding of science.

Usually, STEM subscription boxes will focus on one STEM discipline and provide resources, as well as materials and tools to carry out STEM learning experiences and activities at home with ease – the Spark kit, for example, emphasizes science education in STEM through hands-on experiments and a comic book that teaches children on scientific theories and values through its comic book characters: Alfa, Piper, Patch, and Ollie.

There are certainly many more kinds of educational subscription boxes that Malaysian parents can explore to get for their children.

Not only that, there are also non-educational subscription boxes which are created and curated specifically to help with the role of parenting such as children’s clothing boxes, bath time boxes, and even, baby food boxes.

In general, these children’s subscription boxes are sold in monthly or yearly packages, allowing flexibility for parents to pick and decide what’s best for their whole family.