Category Archives: apps for kids

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Cartoon ABC

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This ABC app for the iPhone/iPad is FREE for a limited time. It is designed to teach 2 – 5 year olds the letters of the alphabet and their sounds. Kids may explore the alphabet in any order that they wish. There are over 100 animations which correspond to the letters of the alphabet. The 3 words for each letter are pronounced and spelled. The illustrations are animated cartoons. Pages for each letter are uncluttered – simply presented but engaging. The app also has a parent section that shows how often your child has visited each letter. Nicely done!

Common Core Standards met:

  • K.RF.1 – Demonstrate understanding of the organization and basic features of print. Recognize and name all upper and lowercase letters of the alphabet.

Check out how it works @http://www.kidsacademy.mobi/cartoon-abc/

Highly Recommended!

Cartoon ABC - Kids Academy Company

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Zoo Champs – Sports Guide for Kids

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Just in time for the second week of the Olympics – Zoo Champs: Sports Guide for Kids is FREE today only. This iPad app (designed for kids 4 -8 years old) has 30 pages of animations and activities that teach about a wide variety of sports. Every sport has a narrated section and a read-only or Q & A section. Historical and amazing facts are presented in a very appealing way. Very cute!

Click here to preview and learn more: http://www.zoochamps.com/

Highly Recommended!

Zoo Champs - sports guide for kids - Bookva Press

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Mini Adventures – Music

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This music app was developed for the iPhone/iPad to teach kids about different genres of music and instruments from all over the world. Over 120 musical words are arranged on a ABC grid. If you tap on a word – it brings it up on a full screen with a link to a featured You Tube video in the upper left hand corner. Access to the videos can be totally disabled if you wish but children cannot link from the featured videos to the You Tube website. Of course, internet access is required to watch the videos. And, I did find a few video links that no longer worked. Even though I did not watch every video in the app, the developer claims that they were all tested for appropriateness.

That being said, the app is able to be customized. For younger kids you can delete the genres of music and just have instruments available which is what I would suggest. I would not want my toddler watching a 9 minute acid jazz video or a punk version of The Monster Mash with bats and skeletons. You can also add your own cards with your own sounds, pictures, and You Tube links. Pretty cool app to teach kids about instruments from all over the world.  But, check it out to make sure that you are comfortable that the content is appropriate for your child’s age.

Recommended if you customize the app to fit the age of your child.

Mini Adventures - Music - Innovative Mobile Apps

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TapQuiz Maps World Edition

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This geography app is FREE for iPhone/iPad. It teaches kids to identify countries, states, or provinces of 22 major regions of the world using a fun game. Kids first choose the region that they would like to be quizzed on. The app names which area is to be found and the child taps the map in the proper spot. Hints can be enabled if you wish. Both accuracy and time are measured. Results are saved in the statistics section of the app which is fairly sophisticated. It gives the fastest time and keeps track of the overall accuracy. You can also see specifically which regions are known/unknown. Two additional games modes are available through an in-app purchase ($.99). Nicely done app!!

Recommended!

TapQuiz Maps World Edition - Rolzor

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Identifying Things

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This FREE app for the iPhone/iPad is geared towards toddlers and has two modes – game and learning. In the learning mode, kids are shown a picture then the word is pronounced. In the game mode, kids tap on the word to have it pronounced then choose the correct picture. Only about 20 animals from two categories (aquatic animals & birds) are available without an in-app purchase. It is supported in two languages – English and Vietnamese. A major problem with the app is that the English pronunciations are not clear – shark sounds like shrock, penguin sounds like pengin – not recommended for this reason.

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Rhyming Words

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This FREE app is designed for the iPhone/iPad to help kids build phonological awareness by identify rhyming sounds. Included are over 200 photograph tiles that match-up to make  100+  pairs of rhyming words. The app starts out easy (only 2 sets to match) and increases to matching 8 sets. The settings allow a lot of flexibility – you can turn audio hints on or off, you can turn tile magnets on or off, and you can add your own voice.  What I really love about this app is that you can add your own sets of matching tiles. The app allows you to take your own photos or choose existing photos then record your own set of rhyming words! So once your child can identify rhyming sounds, you can take it to the next level and he/she can create their own! Wow!!

Common Core Standards met:

  • K.RF.2 – Demonstrate understanding of spoken words, syllables, and sounds (phonemes).  Recognize and produce rhyming words.

Highly recommended!

Rhyming Words - GrasshopperApps.com

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SparkleFish

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SparkleFish is a FREE app for iPhone/iPad that works like a digital version of Mad Libs. Four stories are included in the app with others available as in-app purchases. Kids are asked to provide words from a specific category (animal, body part, etc.) or a specific part of speech (adjectives, nouns, adverbs, past tense verbs, etc.). If the child cannot think of a good word, he/she can get suggestions from SparkleFish by touching the word. Instead of writing the words, kids record their choices in their own voice. Their words are played back in the reading of the story. Kids can save their recordings and listen to them later. There is also a “Chum It!” feature that allows posting comments to Facebook. I am not sure why this is an option in a game seemingly geared towards kids. It would be nice if there were a way to disable it in the settings for use in schools. This app allows kids to practice parts of speech in a fun way. Kids love Mad Libs because the results can be hilarious. I am sure they will feel the same way about SparkleFish 🙂

Recommended with reservations (because of the Facebook link).

SparkleFish - Whosagoodboy Partners

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Toddlers First Words: 6 in 1

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This FREE app for the iPad has toddlers/young learners making 200+ words for objects in 6 different categories – animals, colors, shapes, vehicles, vegetable & fruits, and common words. A picture is show with the word spelled under it (in black). Under the black spelled word are all the letters that make up that word (in orange) but they are scrambled. The child is supposed to drag the orange letters onto the black letters to spell the word (the correct order is not required). As he/she does, each letter is named. When the entire word is complete the word is spelled and named. Nice features: If the child touches the picture, the word is spelled then pronounced. If the child touched a black letter, that letter is named and the corresponding orange letter below twists. I wish the app required the child to spell the words in order – that would help emphasize that words are written from left to right. Lots of letter practice is built into this app but I wish developers would also include lower case letters when creating an app for kids.

Worth downloading to see if this app is something your child would enjoy but the Common Core Standards for kindergarten require recognition and naming of all upper and lower case letters.

Toddlers First Words : 6 in 1 - Deepak Demiwal

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Super Shapes

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This FREE app for the iPad teaches 5 shapes – circle, square, triangle, rectangle, and star. In the first activity, it tells the name of each shape and gives one attribute of it. Then it asks the child to list objects that are that shape but there are no follow-up examples given after this request. The next activity has the child tracing the shape words and the shapes. Lastly, the child is supposed to spin a spinner and draw the shape that it lands on. Again there is no follow-up so that the child can check if he/she is correct. There is just not enough to this app that I feel that I can recommend it.

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Letter School Lite

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This letter writing app for the iPhone/iPad has a FREE lite version (a – e) that you can preview before you decided if  you want to purchase full version for $2.99.  It is designed to teach 4 – 6 year olds how to write upper & lower case letters and numbers. It starts by showing the shape of the letter, naming it, giving its sound and a word that starts with that sound. The child learns where to start and end the letter. Then the child traces the letter. Finally, the child tries to write the letter from memory. At the end of these three exercises for each letter, there are fireworks. The graphics are simply done but very appealing. I like the size of the letters  – nice and big for little hands. The app has 3 typefaces (Zaner-Bloser, HWT, D’Nealian) in the settings. This app is nicely done and from what I see in this lite version, I am assuming that the full version is worth $2.99.

Common Core Standards met:

  • K.RF.1 – Recognize and name all upper and lowercase letters of the alphabet.

Recommended!

LetterSchool Lite - Boreaal