The In Your Own Voice Storyteller lets children enjoy a bedtime story with a familiar family voice – even if there's no familiar family member around. A parent, older sibling or grandparent records passages of a book onto a child friendly pen programmed with specifically coded stickers that can be attached to the relevant pages of a story book. All a child needs to do is place the pen over the sticker on the book’s page and the recording will play.

 

Each of the 600 stickers are individually encoded with a series of dots (similar to a bar code) which can be programmed to the recording pen and then stored on the pen’s in-built memory.

 

The set also includes 40 stickers with different pre-programmed sound effects like a cat meowing or a phone ringing.

 

The manufacturers and retailers uphold the pen is a great idea for single parents or for periods when parents are away. Whilst nothing can really replace a real life bedtime story with crazy voices from dad, they say, this product is a great idea to encourage early reading skills and to keep children feeling at ease and entertained. On the other hand, the pen was also slammed by parents with deep concerns about the growing lack of non-verbal communication with young children.

 

Available from US shops and retailers for US$79.95, the In Your Own Voice Storyteller requires two AAA batteries and is suitable for children aged 3 and up.