This flashcard app for the iPad is FREE. Language selections include: English, Spanish, French, German, Russian, Greek, and Italian.These realistically illustrated flashcards have four categories – numbers, letters, animals, &  foods.  All 4 have subcategories. The app is very simple – flashcards only, no sound. If used with a nonreader, a teacher/parent would have to be involved to make sure that the child was identifying items correctly. Words are written but not pronounced. The intended audience for this app becomes greater when it is switched to a different language. That’s when a pronunciation option would be particularly helpful.  If you are looking for electronic flashcards, the price is right 🙂

This iPhone/iPad app sells for $1.99. According to the developers, the focus of the game is to get parent and child talking, learning, and sharing together. You and your child are trying to rescue animals from the bad Red Witch. To save the animals you must teach your child the animal name as well as the name and the sound of its beginning letter. Paddy, a small iPad-like character leads you through the program. In between the lessons are silly little riddles for the your child to enjoy. The graphics are simple in a pixelated style (like old video games). While I applaud the developer’s effort to get parent and child working together, the app is just not something that I would recommend. Paddy is a bit too enthusiastic and way too loud for me. Also, the app is somewhat limited  – it only teaches letter names and sounds.

This iPad app normally sells for $1.99 but I was able to download it on a FREE day. It was designed (for toddlers) by a dad as a digital toy to encourage creative play while learning the alphabet. Your child starts by choosing an upper case alphabet letter.  After the letter is named, your child can paint it one of 6 colors. Once painted, the letter becomes a refrigerator magnet. In “the kitchen” your child can use his/her letters to spell words or short messages. There is a wastebasket to get rid of letters that are not needed. There is also a camera to take a picture of your child’s creation (which is saved in your photos). This option allows you to create a scene that you can then pull into story telling apps such as Art Maker, Story Time, etc. (see earlier reviews). This app is straightforward – it is simple to use and there are no third-party ads or in-app purchases. A nice addition to this app would be settings that permitted you to change the letters to lower case.

Keep reading my blog for app alerts which will let readers know when the apps that I have reviewed are available for FREE  🙂

This app was just released for the iPad on June 29, 2012 and is FREE for a limited time. PlaySquare is billed as “touchable television” which lets your child (ages 3 – 6) play and learn in Word World. “Happy Birthday Dog” is the first episode. There are so many wonderful things about this app. It is colorful and engaging. Early literacy skills (letter recognition, letter sound, word building, word recognition) are developed throughout the story. The characters are funny and lovable. And, I especially like how the letters of the word form the object being spelled. I LOVE this app!

Watch the video from the developers @ http://playsquare.tv/

Highly recommended – one of the cutest and best apps that I have seen so far!

ABC (Australian Broadcasting Company) created Art Maker (for iPad) to go with the television program, Play School, which is the longest running children’s show in Australia.  If you search for this app in iTunes, it sells for $2.99. But… if you use this link not only can you can preview the app but the iTunes download comes up for FREE  🙂  – Play School – Apps – ABC For Kids.

Kids (2 – 6 years old) first choose a background from the 6 preexisting backgrounds or 16 colors of paper in the program. Or… they can use a their own photo – which gives this app lots of flexibility. Then kids choose characters and objects to add to their scene. They can create a picture, a slide show, or an animated movie as the narrator encourages kids to “get ready to move your toys and make some noise.” Creations can be saved in the My Art Section of the app to be shared later with family and friends.

Adorable, creative, and highly recommended!

This app for the iPad is currently $1.99 but I downloaded it on a FREE day 🙂 Geared for preschoolers to first graders, this app has two activities: Word Box and Puzzle Box. There are 30 animal pictures which are used for both activities. Additional themed sets can be purchased for $.99. Kids earn stars as the progress through the levels of this program. Those stars can be used to purchase things to decorate their rooms. I think little ones would love this feature. The program also allows you to have 4 different players.

Puzzle Box has 3 different levels with 4 to 24 piece puzzles.

Word Box has three levels that teach letter sounds and letter names. In level one, letter sounds are given as the child moves upper case letters into place to form an animal name. Letter hints are shown. Level two also works with letter sounds but this time it uses lower case letters with only color hints are given. Neither of these levels actually names the letter. At level three, kids are expected to spell the word with the letter tiles – no hints. Letters are named  – no letter sounds are given. The phonics used in this program is not perfect. Some of the letter combinations in this app are incorrectly “chunked.” Word chunks are letters that go together to make one sound  – combinations such ch, th, ck, ay, er, or, oo, ou, ow, etc. I was particularly bothered that “le” was chunked at the end of whale and “ke” was chunked at the end of snake. The most important letter relationships in both of those words is between the a & e. I wish the app would have focused on that important relationship. There was also some inconsistency of letter sounds. Since our 26 letters combine in so many ways to make 40+ sounds, it would be especially challenging to write a phonics app. I am interested to see what other phonics apps offer.