Learning Tower Archives - Improve Motor Skills

There are tons of learning towers and kitchen helpers out there, each of them with their own pros and cons. Before we got one for our 15-month-old, we did a lot of research and in the end, decided to get the Leea learning tower. Now we’ve had the chance to thoroughly test it with our daughter and here’s what we can say about it. Leea learning tower is the most multifunctional learning tower you can think of. It can be set up as a height-adjustable learning tower, a chair and table, a climbing frame, or a high chair. Functionality can be increased even further with multiple add-ons, like a slide and magnetic blackboard. When researching learning towers, we had two main criteria. It had to be height-adjustable and convertible into a chair and table. Considering how many different learning towers there are (there are almost 500 different ones on Etsy alone), it took us by surprise that we could not find a single one that matched both those criteria. So it seemed like there weren't any out there. Well, there is one - the Leea tower (view it on Etsy). And that’s it. If you want to see the data from our research, check our article about the comparison of different learning towers. So it wasn’t a difficult decision for us to get the tower from Leea Toys. Disclaimer: I need to mention that we were ready to place our order but then decided to contact the company and ask if they could send us a free one if we wrote an honest review about their product on our website. And they agreed. Had they not, we still would have bought one and written this review. Summary Here’s a quick summary of what we like and don’t like about the tower. ProsConsExtremely multifunctional:- Learning tower- Chair & table- High chair- Climbing frame- Multiple add-onsAbove average priceHeight-adjustable (a rare case among convertible towers)No finish on the cut-outsGood quality, very sturdy And now to details. Multifunctionality Leea Toys builds, by far, the most multifunctional learning towers we’ve come across. When you buy the tower, you’ll get a height-adjustable learning tower, a high chair, and a table and chair set - all in one product. Image source: Leea Toys Learning Tower with Adjustable Height This is one of the main reasons why we decided to get this tower. Kids usually use learning towers for about three-four years between the ages of 1 and 5. And kids grow quite a bit over this time. As they grow, the standing height should be adjusted, so they could keep working in an ergonomic position. Leea learning tower has three height settings and we are currently using the highest setting (our baby girl at 15 months is 2 ft 6 in / 80 cm tall). The three settings should be enough to provide her a comfortable and ergonomic working position for many years. Another nice thing with the tower is that it can be set up with multiple levels of enclosure. You can leave the back and front completely open, or cover one or both of them for added safety. Table and Chair This is the second main reason why we wanted to get the Leea learning tower. It was the ONLY learning tower we could find that was height-adjustable AND could be used as a chair and a table. I’m not sure why many other manufacturers use complicated hinge-systems to transform the towers into tables. The Leea tower can just be placed horizontally on its back to set it up as a table and a chair. You’ll have to move one board into a new position but that only takes you 15 seconds. Two children can use it as a table at the same time (one at each end). Most other learning towers that have the table and chair option can only seat one child. The second seat is not as wide as the primary one, but it’s still very handy when your little one has a friend over for a playdate. You can also insert the table board at a small angle to make it more comfortable for the child to use it for drawing. A Climbing Frame There are multiple ways to set the tower up as a climbing frame for your child: Keep the tower vertical and place it away from furniture and walls so that both sides are open. Let your kid climb up on the standing board from one side, down from the other side, or crawl through the tower from under the board.If you get the slide add-on, pop it into place to turn the tower into a slide. Place the tower horizontally and play around with the additional slabs to build obstacles inside the frame This is one of the biggest values we got from the tower that we didn’t expect at first. As our daughter is eager to climb everything, it was a nice supplement to her climbing tools. If you value climbing opportunities for your child, I recommend getting the slide add-on as it can be used both for sliding and connecting the tower to various other tools (like a Pikler triangle or arch) or furniture (sofa, chairs, etc.) The slide is an absolute favorite with our daughter. She can easily spend half an hour climbing up and sliding down. She also loves putting her cuddly toys, balls, and other objects on the slide and watching them slide down. High Chair By changing the position of two boards, you can transform the learning tower into a high chair (it takes about 30 seconds). It’s a simple high chair with a seat, a tray table, and a footrest. Our tower came with a felt wrap (it’s an add-on you can buy with the tower) and it should make the seating more comfortable and safe for smaller babies. We tested the wrap but our 15-month-old didn’t have any issues without the felt wrap either. Nevertheless, we decided not to use the Leea tower as a high chair with our daughter at the moment because: We already had a high chair;It was too much of a hassle to clean the wooden tower, especially the unfinished inner parts, multiple times a day. Our daughter is a very messy eater and the plastic Ikea high chair is just so much easier to clean. Add-Ons You can buy some great accessories to get even more functionality out of the tower. Here are the ones that we have. Slide One side of this board is just plain plywood, covered with lacquer, that can be used as a slide when attached to the learning tower. The tower itself has three height setups (to match the height of your child) and so does the slide. So you can set it lower if you have a younger kid, and higher if he/she is already older. After setting up the tower, this was the first thing we tested with our baby girl, and she loved it. We used the lowest setting and she kept climbing up from one end and sliding down the other. The next day we set it to the highest setting and it was fit for her level as well. Climbing up the tower and sliding down has been a hit ever since. We’ve had it for 2 weeks at the time of posting this article and we’ve used the slide almost every day. Magnetic Blackboard The other side of the slide is a magnetic blackboard that can be attached vertically to the tower. Just like everything else with this tower, this piece also has multiple purposes: a blackboard for drawing and making notes, a board for magnetic toys, and a safety feature to protect your kid from falling off the tower when standing on it. We have tested the blackboard with Djeco magnetic animals (check them on Amazon) and chalk but our daughter hasn’t been too eager to work with them so far. She has shown interest in them every few days but not for too long. A Pathways Board It’s another piece of plywood with specific patterns cut into it. If you replace the blackboard with this board, it acts as the safety feature for the tower but also allows your kid to move around special pieces of wood inside those cut-in patterns. Our daughter doesn’t show too much interest in this board yet but we’ll update this post as she gets older. Multiple Other Add-Ons We haven’t tested any other add-ons ourselves but the tower can be combined with many-many other items to create playing and learning possibilities for your child. Some of them include: Baby swingPaper roll for the tableLego base for the tableLock doors boardColored pegs boardArt easelShuffleboard game Quality (material, finish) The overall quality of the Leea learning tower is very good. As it is made of plywood, we found some smaller irregularities in the wood but it was irrelevant to us and can be expected from wooden items. Once assembled, the tower is very sturdy and stands firmly on the ground. Our daughter sometimes likes to hold the front bar and rock herself back and forth in the tower as if trying to knock the tower over but at least for now, we have no fear that she could actually make it fall over. The board that the child stands on, is locked into position, so we never worried that the board would move and our daughter could fall. The tower is quite heavy but luckily it comes with wheels, making it easy to move around the house. However, one of the wheels on our tower tends to fall off sometimes when we do need to lift it, e.g. over a door sill. And hauling it around on wheels is a bit noisy, so if you live in an apartment building and have downstairs neighbors, that’s something to consider. Still, it’s a nice feature to have. One big issue with the specimen we got was that the rungs, insertable boards, and the inside of the tower are not finished with any oil, wax, or lacquer. This means that the tower is difficult to clean after using it as a high chair. Dan Popa, the owner of Leea Toys, explained that they are constantly improving the tower and their production, so new models coming out around the end of 2020 will have those parts treated as well. To solve the problem myself, I added two layers of linseed oil to the aforementioned details. It took me 2x7 minutes, so it wasn’t a big deal for me. Easy Set-Up and Quick Conversions It takes about 15 minutes to do the initial setup of the Leea learning tower - just screw in 12 screws to connect the two sides with the six wooden rungs. It didn’t come with any felt pads to protect the floors, so we added some ourselves under the tower. Once the frame is finished, slide in the three boards to create the ‘structure’ you want: learning tower, table & chair, high chair, climbing frame, etc. Most of these setups take up to 30 seconds, so it is easy to switch between them. Something that impressed me, was the hex key that came with the package. You usually get a small one if you buy something that you can pretty much throw away once finished, but this one is a keeper :) Bonus points to Leea Toys for making the setup process easier. Price The price of Leea learning tower is above average but I’d say it’s well worth it. From our experience, we recommend getting at least the tower and the slide. Everything else is up to your specific requirements. Check the current price on Etsy. Conclusion If you want a height-adjustable learning tower that can also be converted into a chair and table, the Leea learning tower is probably your only option. It’s highly multifunctional and is well made but a bit pricey. Despite having some small kinks, we still believe it’s well worth its price and recommend it to anyone looking for a learning tower with added functionality.