Top Ten Backpack Essentials
by Danielle Wood
The school year's coming fast. We’ve done the comparison-shopping, so you don’t have to! From pencils that never need sharpening to cell phones that shut themselves off during school hours, here’s some loot to make your kids smile on their way to the bus stop.
A Little History
If that old picture of you in rainbow legwarmers makes you cringe, take heart. Everything old is new again. Retro is hot, and it’s made its way into this year’s school supplies. Even the Trapper Keeper is back. That’s right, 80’s geekdom just became millennial cool. It also happens to be a great way to keep notes neat and tidy with colored dividers, lots of pockets, and a vinyl embossed spine that even the family Saint Bernard can’t chew through. The Trapper has a clear plastic pocket on the front, so kids can create their own covers with photos, magazine clippings, and drawings. Rad. (Mead Trapper Keeper, $6.99)
A Great Gadget
Get your kid one of these pens and they’ll be begging you to let them take notes in class. In a nutshell, the Fly Fusion is a pen and scanner in one. The pen can write like a regular old ballpoint, but it can also read 70 images per second off the specialized paper in the included notebook. So kids can scribble to their heart’s content, then upload their handwritten notes and instantly convert them into digital files or emails. Plus, the pen can download MP3s, translate words into French or Spanish, and spell check an essay on the fly, as you write it. The inside flap of the notebook has a calculator and scheduling tool built in--with just a few taps, kids can score quick calculations, or jot down a reminder about that looming essay assignment. (Leapfrog Fly Fusion, $79.99)
