Category Archives: handwriting apps

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Madagascar: My ABCs

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Madagascar- My ABCs

FREE for a limited time – Madagascar: My ABCs. If your preschooler is a fan of Madagascar, you may want to check out this educational app. It teaches letters (upper & lower case), letter sounds, and letter formation. There are also songs to sing and poems for each letter! Kids can create their own alphabet books with the help of 400+ stickers that reinforce beginning sounds. Kids can also travel on a field trips with Alex, Marty, Melman, and Gloria to tropical beaches, New York City, savannahs, and jungles in a fun game called Sticker Safari. Kids use their trusty binoculars to find hidden letter stickers. If you have more than one child, no problem – the app allows more than one child to play and save their work & progress. Fun for little ones. 🙂

Madagascar: My ABCs - Knowledge Adventure

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Little Writer – The Tracing App for Kids

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FREE again – Little Writer is a letter writing app for the iPhone/iPad that is designed to teach 3 – 6 year olds how to write upper & lower case letters, numbers, shapes, and words. It starts by showing the shape of the letter and naming it. The child traces along lines to write the letter. Then the child is praised and told what letter, number, shape or word he/she has just written. When writing a word, the letters are presented one at a time with the full word shown in the upper right-hand corner. When the word is finished, a picture pops up with the child’s writing underneath it.

There are a lot of great things about this app. I like the size of the letters  – nice and big for little hands. I also like that there are subtle dotted lines on the page. But, the best part of this app is the ability to customize it. You can turn items on or off in order to introduce letters, numbers, etc. slowly. You can record your voice or your child’s voice pronouncing the names of the letters, numbers, etc. You can add in your own pictures & words so that your child can learn to write his/her own name and names of family members or whatever you wish! You can add additional letters for foreign words so that you can use it to teach simple words in another language. SO many possibilities……

Common Core Standards met:

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

Highly Recommended!

Little Writer - The Tracing App for Kids - Innovative Mobile Apps

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Cursive Writing HD

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FREE again – Cursive Writing HD normally sells for $.99. It shows kids how to write in cursive utilizing three modes. In the abc mode, both upper case and lower case letters are taught. Kids are shown how to trace each letter using the proper stroke sequence. This section of the app is very well-done.

In the word mode, kids are shown how letters combine to form 234 words. Then in the sentence mode kids can practice writing one of the 3 sentences provided. Or, they can type in their own sentence which is converted to cursive. What a great idea! But… the letter style (in both the word mode and the sentence mode) is not the same as the letter style of the abc mode. For example, the lower case o and b become very loopy. Many of the upper case letters are formed in completely different way than they were taught in the abc mode. Many words are not started on the base line.

After teaching cursive writing for 30 years, I know that the biggest challenge is teaching kids to properly connect the letters. This app does a nice job of teaching the individual letters in the abc mode but I would be hesitant to recommend/use it in the word mode or sentence mode.

Cursive Writing HD - Jiwoo Studio

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Montessori Worksheets for Kids HD: Traceable ABC Letters

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Montessori Worksheets for Kids -Traceable ABC Letters

FREE for a limited time – the full version of Montessori Worksheets for Kids HD: Traceable ABC Letters. This app uses a 2-step process to teach kids how to write upper and lower case letters. First kids trace the letters. Then they write the letter independently. Each letter is presented with a picture/word that begins with that letter so that kids are also introduced to the sounds of the letters. Also included with the app is a progress chart. If you have a little one learning to write, download this app today. It is nicely done!!

Montessori Worksheets for Kids HD: Traceable ABC Letters - Kids Academy Company

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Easter Apps

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Links to a few FREE Easter apps that I have found – enjoy!!

Bunnyfur

Bunnyfur’s Easter Eggs – an interactive book for toddlers. Kids help decorate eggs, find hidden eggs, etc. Short but cute!

Bunnyfur's Easter Eggs - Interactive Touch, Inc.

Clicky

ClickySticky Easter is a creative app for kids that lets them decorate eggs, fill Easter baskets, hide eggs in the yard, and more!

ClickySticky Easter - Merge Mobile

Jasper

Jasper in The Great Easter Egg Race is another adventure of Jasper & Smiley. Fluffy the bunny has hidden eggs all over the house for an Easter egg hunt. The first one to find 5 eggs wins!

Jasper in The Great Easter Egg Race StoryChimes... - Siena Entertainment, LLC

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Artmail

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Artmail

FREE for a limited time! Add a personal touch to your emails with Artmail, an app for writing and sending handwritten notes. The app features several choices of stationery plus the option of using your camera to create a unique background. The writing is a brush style (similar to a fountain pen) with several color options. But the best part of this app is the scaling feature – which makes this app great for kids. Users can fill up the entire screen and the app automatically shrinks the word/words to fit in a letter format. Subsequent words are shrunk to match the size of the other words. A red cursor can be moved around to change the location of the words. Little hands will be able to write thank you notes to grandparents or to add a note of explanation to a photo. In the classroom, teachers could use it is SO many ways – for good copies of their writing, to communicate with parents, as an exit slip after a lesson, etc. I LOVE that this app preserves the child’s writing!!  Very cool app – perhaps an upgrade will include the ability to pull in pictures from the photo library which would make it even better!!

ArtMail - Wen Yun Rong

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Cursive Writing HD

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This iPad app normally sells for $.99 but I was able to download on a FREE day. It shows kids how to write in cursive utilizing three modes. In the abc mode, both upper case and lower case letters are taught. Kids are shown how to trace each letter using the proper stroke sequence. This section of the app is very well-done. In the word mode, kids are shown how letters combine to form 234 words. In the sentence mode, kids can practice writing one of the 3 sentences provided or they can type in their own sentence which is converted to cursive. What a great idea! Unfortunately, the writing style (in both the word mode and the sentence mode) is not consistent with the writing style of the abc mode. For example, the lower case o and b become very loopy. Many upper case letters are formed in completely different way. Words are not started on the base line. After teaching cursive writing for 30 years, I know that the biggest challenge is teaching kids to properly connect the letters. This app does a nice job of teaching the individual letters in the abc mode but I would not recommend/use the word or sentence mode.

Cursive Writing HD - Jiwoo Studio

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Little Writer – The Tracing App for Kids

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This FREE letter writing app for the iPhone/iPad is designed to teach 3 – 6 year olds how to write upper & lower case letters, numbers, shapes, and words. It starts by showing the shape of the letter and naming it. The child traces along lines to write the letter. Then the child is praised and told what letter, number, shape or word he/she has just written. When writing a word, the letters are presented one at a time with the full word shown in the upper right-hand corner. When the word is finished, a picture pops up with the child’s writing underneath it.

There are a lot of great things about this app. I like the size of the letters  – nice and big for little hands. I also like that there are subtle dotted lines on the page. But, the best part of this app is the ability to customize it. You can turn items on or off in order to introduce letters, numbers, etc. slowly. You can record your voice or your child’s voice pronouncing the names of the letters, numbers, etc. You can add in your own pictures & words so that your child can learn to write his/her own name and names of family members or whatever you wish! You can add additional letters for foreign words so that you can use it to teach simple words in another language. SO many possibilities……

Common Core Standards met:

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

Highly Recommended!

Little Writer - The Tracing App for Kids - Innovative Mobile Apps

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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

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iWriteWords Lite

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This app is the FREE preview version of iWriteWords, a handwriting app for toddlers for the iPhone/iPad. Kids drag their fingers to help Mr. Crab collect numbered balls and learn to write the letters of the alphabet as they do so. Once all of the letters in a word are drawn properly, a child-created drawing appears. Numbers, upper and lower case letters are taught. In the settings, additional letter styles and voices (Spanish, French, Italian, German) are available. There is even an option to slightly adjust the app for left-handed kids. 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!

iWriteWords Lite - gdiplus