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Jack and the Beanstalk by Mindshapes

FREE again – Jack and the Beanstalk, an app for the iPhone/iPad – this interactive read-along is a humorous, modern version of a classic tale. The app has 2 options: Read by Myself or Read to Me. The words are highlighted as they are read to help the emerging reader. The animations & illustrations are delightful with interactivity on every page. Teachers could use this app to compare and contrast this modern version to the classic version! This app is really cute and definitely worth downloading!!

The National Parenting Publication Awards: Honors winner in the Children’s Media/Virtual category

Jack and the Beanstalk by Mindshapes - Mindshapes Limited

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ABCmouse.com 26 A-Z Music Videos

a to z

FREE – A to Z Music Videos. This app has 26 animated videos  – one for each letter of the alphabet. As kids watch the videos, they earn tickets to unlock other videos. There is also an option to purchase tickets to unlock videos more quickly. The videos are top-notch! They help children learn letter names and sounds AND develop vocabulary. Every video is produced in a different musical style, so kids are also introduced to a wide variety of musical genres. This app is a must-have for preschool, kindergarten, and first grade teachers – a perfect introduction to the letters of the alphabet!

Common Core Standards met:

  • K. RF.3 – Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words. Demonstrate basic knowledge of one-to-one letter-sound correspondences by producing the primary sound or many of the most frequent sounds for each consonant. Associate the short sounds with common spellings (graphemes) for the five major vowels.

ABCmouse.com 26 A-Z Music Videos - Age of Learning, Inc.

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ABCmouse.com – Ham with Jam, Dan & Jan, Hen in the Pen, Big Pig & Little Pig, To Run is Fun, Big Bug & Little Bug

FREE for a limited time – 6 beginning reading apps!! These apps for the iPhone/iPad are from the ABC Mouse word family beginning reader series. I chose to downloaded The Hen in the Pen to review the series. Each story emphasizes words from a particular word family. There are also easy sight words in the stories. There are several ways that the books can be read: Read to Me, Read with Pause, I Can Read It, and Hear the Words. I really like the Hear the Words option. It allows the child to read alone but tap any word that he/she gets stuck on. There are parent tips on the title page that explain word families and sight words for beginning readers. There are also parent tips throughout the books. The illustrations are colorful and support the text so that kids can use picture clues as they read. The story lines are very simple. But, that is not a negative thing because these apps are more about the process of reading than the actual story. When my son was an early reader, he loved books like these because he could read them “all by himself” and that alone makes them worth downloading 🙂 And…. they are currently FREE.

Common Core Standards met:

K.RF.3 – Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words. c. Read common high-frequency words by sight (e.g., the, of, to, you, she, my, is, are, do, does). d. Distinguish between similarly spelled words by identifying the sounds of the letters that differ.

Recommended!

ABCmouse.com Ham and Jam - Age of Learning, Inc. Ham with Jam    ABCmouse.com Dan and Jan - Age of Learning, Inc. Dan and Jan

ABCmouse.com The Hen in the Pen - Age of Learning, Inc. Hen in the Pen     ABCmouse.com Big Pig and Little Pig - Age of Learning, Inc. Big Pig & Little Pig

ABCmouse.com To Run is Fun - Age of Learning, Inc. To Run is Fun   ABCmouse.com Big Bug and Little Bug - Age of Learning, Inc. Big Bug and Little Bug

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Bug Games HD

bug games

Singing crickets! Bug Games HD is FREE for a limited time. This super cute app for preschoolers has 4 sections: Cricket Concert, Bee Word Builder, Ant Tunnel Builder, and Spider Dot-to-Dot. In the Cricket Concert section, kids can select a song to hear the crickets sing together or they can tap on each cricket to play the song on their own. In Bee Word Builder, kids hear the phonic pronunciation of individual letters as they use them to put words together. Ant Tunnel Builder requires kids to rotate puzzle pieces so that the ants can march through a completed tunnel. Spider Dot-to-Dot has kids connecting dots in numerical order. Kids collect sticker rewards along the way. This app has a nice combination of learning games for preschoolers – cute, fun, & engaging! Who knew playing with bugs could be so much fun 🙂

Bug Games HD - by Busy Bee Studios - Busy Bee Studios

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Dino-Store Storybook

dino-store

FREE for a limited time – Dino-Store, a funny interactive story for early readers. Leo and his father go to the store to get eggs and chose a carton of HUGE ones. 12 baby dinosaurs hatch out and that’s where the fun begins! Kids can choose to follow along or read on their own as they enjoy the cute illustrations and fun interactions. And…the story line leaves it open for a sequel! This book would be great for teaching story sequence or as a springboard to writing about the dinosaurs’ further adventures.

Dino-Store Storybook - Bluemarker

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Sail Through Math

sail through math

Ahoy there!! FREE today (normally $1.99), Sail through Math from McGraw Hill – a fun way for students to practice their math facts/skills. There are 3 levels of play for addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division facts. Other areas covered are addition equations. subtraction equations, multiplication equations, two-step equations, names for numbers, patterns/factors/multiples, and compare numbers. This app provides of great practice built around a pirate theme – complete with music and firing cannonballs! At the end of each game, the child can see what problems he/she missed as well as a percentage score. What a fun way to learn basic facts – in the classroom, at home, in the car on a way to an evening activity. I used to tell my students to practice during commercials – 10 to 15 minutes a day works wonders. This app provides a fun way to accomplish that goal 🙂

Common Core Standards met:

  • 1.OA.6 – Add and subtract within 20, demonstrating fluency for addition and subtraction within 10.
  • 2.OA.2 – Fluently add and subtract within 20 using mental strategies. By end of Grade 2, know from memory all sums of two one-digit numbers.
  • 3.OA.7 – Fluently multiply and divide within 100, using strategies such as the relationship between multiplication and division or properties of operations. By the end of Grade 3, know from memory all products of two one-digit numbers.

Sail Through Math - McGraw-Hill School Education Group

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Trading Cards

trading cards

Fabulous app!!! ReadWriteThink’s Trading Cards is powerful FREE app developed by the International Reading Association. This app provides a unique way for kids to share their understanding of topics, generate their own study aids, create a fictional world to use in their writing, make their own trading cards, and more. There are 7 categories of cards available within the app: fictional person, real person, fictional place, real place, object, event, and vocabulary. Kids start by choosing a category and typing in the title of the card. Each category has specific questions which help kids create information-rich trading cards. Images can be added by using the device’s camera or by accessing pictures in the photo library. Kids can also sort their cards into collections such as characters from a book, heroes or villains, landmarks, the 50 states, vocabulary by subject, etc. The possibilities are endless! Cards can be shared via email, saved to the photo library, or printed on a wireless printer. And… the kid appeal is tremendous. Kids will LOVE trading their cards with their classmates 🙂

Highly recommended!!

Trading Cards - International Reading Association

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Lincoln – Quelle Histoire

lincoln

FREE today, just in time for Presidents’ Day – Lincoln. This app includes a story about Abraham Lincoln’s life, a portrait gallery of Lincoln & others, and some games. The book can be read by a narrator or on your own. Lots of bigger words in this one, for example: envisaged, eloquence, adversary, promulgated. So… it might be best to read the story as a group. Then, the class could figure out the meaning of the words together using context clues. This book can be read in 4 different languages. This is a great feature, but I wish the developers would have used native readers. Because of the larger words, I think younger kids could have some difficulty with the narrator’s pronunciations – another reason to read it together. I liked how the story included dates and/or Lincoln’s age on almost every page. For that reason, the story could also be used to teach kids how to create a timeline. This app would work in a one iPad classroom with teacher and students reading/working together. 

Lincoln - Quelle Histoire - Quelle Histoire

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National Geographic World Atlas

national geo

Currently FREE – National Geographic World Atlas for the iPhone/iPad. Updated for 2013, this app has a new look and improved functionality. Spin the interactive 3-D globe and zoom in on specific places. Place pins to mark spots and save them for later. Use the measurement tool to find the distance between two locations. Get information on every country and capital city in the world – socio-economic data, demographics, weather, & currency. New features include the ability to: add customize map pins, store pins in the cloud and share across devices, access up to the minute weather, check currency rates, see latitude & longitude with a tap of our finger. This app would be a great reference tool to have in a classroom. Teachers can easily access a map to show students where a current event is happening, where a story takes place, etc. Download while it’s FREE  🙂

National Geographic World Atlas - National Geographic Society

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Learn with WordFriends

word friends

Learn with WordFriends is a FREE educational game from WordWorld, PBS’s Emmy winning show. Kids build and discover words with Dog, Duck, Sheep, Ant, Bear, Pig and Frog. Animal characters and word objects are formed from the words’ letters – a very cool feature! There are 3 puzzles to play: WordRain – grab letters as they rain from the sky to build the word, WordScramble – rearrange the scrambled letters to form the word, and WordMatch – a tile memory game. There is also a WordFriend Farms where kids can interact with the different animal characters. Dog is included with the app and the other animals are available as in-app purchases. Very cute, happy app!

If you like this app, also check out PlaySquare which features the same characters. Here is a link to my earlier review on that one 🙂
playsquare « Search Results « appydazeblog

Enjoy them both – they are super cute!

Learn with WordFriends - WordWorld