Tag Archives: educational apps for kids

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Look Out Larry & Lost Larry

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Look Out Larry

FREE for a limited time – 2 interactive books from Wasabi: Look Out Larry & Lost Larry. Larry is an adorable green lizard and the main character in these two adventures for 2 – 6 year olds.

In Look Out Larry, kids help Larry stay safe and find a cozy place to sleep by helping to protect him from the dangers of the Australian bush – a spider, a snake, a brush fire, etc. At the end, there is an alternative version of the story called Larry’s Dream. Larry dreams of defending himself against the dangers of the bush in some cute & clever ways. The educational app also includes a matching game.

In Lost Larry, kids help Larry find his way home across rivers, over canyons, over a rickety bridge, etc. This is Larry’s third and most ambitious adventure! Kids will love helping Larry make it home. They pet his little green head to put him to sleep once he gets there! Cute educational app!!

Look Out Larry! animated story book - Wasabi Productions - Wasabi Productions   Look Out Larry          Lost Larry interactive story book - Wasabi Productions - Wasabi Productions   Lost Larry

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Toca Hair Salon

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FREE again today – Toca Hair Salon, one of my favorite educational apps for toddlers! Kids go into the salon to groom 6 different characters. They can use the tools in the salon to style their hair – cut it, comb it, make it grow, shave it, color it, etc. Great sound effects are also included in this fun app. Kids or parents can take a photo of the finished creation and save it to their camera roll. If parents wish, creations may be posted on the Toca Boca Facebook page. The developers have also built-in options to turn off sounds, pictures, and news. What a great springboard for creative writing – give a character a whole new look and write a story to go with it. What a fun writing activity for a Wacky Hair Day!!

Toca Hair Salon - Toca Boca AB

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EyePaint Animals

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Eye Paint Animals

EyePaint Animals is FREE again for a limited time. This educational app let your child paint illustrations from Japanese artist, Mitsue Haya, in a very unique way. Kids”paint” using their cameras to capture the colors, textures, patterns around them. To begin, a child chooses one of the 10 included illustrations. He/she taps to select the area to be filled in and the creativity begins! Work can be saved to the photo library for sharing or printing. Easy, fun, and very creative!!

Eye Paint Animals - Curious Hat

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Jellytoons Birthday Countdown

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FREE again for a limited time –Jellytoons Birthday Countdown for toddlers (18 months +). It’s Bobo’s birthday and his friends – Flo, Inky, Max, Noodles, Pip and Rex are invited to his party. Kids have to help all of the friends get to the party on time by… waking up Max, feeding Rex, helping Flo down from the sky, finding Pip, helping Noodles wrap a present, and cheering up Inky. The activities help develop fine motor skills, shape matching, and logic & observation skills. The characters are happy, googly-eyed little blobs – just looking at them makes you smile. The animations are colorful and cleverly done. I think little ones would enjoy this educational app  – a prequel to Jellytoons: Bobo’s Birthday Challenge (see review Sept. 16).

Jellytoons Birthday Countdown - Mindshapes Limited

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Hickory Dickory Dock

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Hickory Dickory Dock, an educational app for the iPhone/iPad is FREE again for a limited time. Your child can learn to read a clock to the nearest hour while playing with an adorable, purple mouse. Kids begin by setting the time on the clock. For each hour there is an exploration that sends the lovable little mouse bouncing, springing and sleeping his way through the nursery rhyme accompanied by catchy music, sounds effects, and fun animations. The explorations in Hickory Dickory Dock simulate principles of physics –  gravity, collision, friction, weight, etc. as kids play pinball with the mouse, balance weights on a set of scales, and bounce the mouse off the walls of the clock. Very cute for preschoolers – a fun way to learn how to tell time with some physics slipped in as a bonus 🙂

Hickory Dickory Dock - Mindshapes Limited

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Let’s Color

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FREE for a limited time – another educational app from the makers of Squiggles. And just like Squiggles, Let’s Color encourages creativity! The app includes an animated short in which the characters – Bobu, the monkey  & Miku, the rabbit use their imaginations to turn triangles into a strawberry, a dog, a mountain, etc. Then kids are encouraged to color different things to complete a page: what is coming out of a hose, who is riding in the train, etc. Once the coloring is completed, they press GO and the drawings come alive. There are 17 coloring pages as well as a blank page for your child to create his/her own pictures. Additional coloring pages can be purchased within the app. Tools included are stickers, markers, paint, chalk, a ketchup bottle, as well as 10 colors & a mystery color wheel. Work can be saved into the gallery of the parents’ section by pressing the piggy bank. This app is super cute!! Just like Squiggles, it encourages children to be imaginative & creative 🙂

Highly recommended!

Let's Color! - Lazoo Worldwide, Inc

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Tap A Tune

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This educational app makes me smile!! It’s an adorable (for the iPhone/iPad) and it’s FREE again for a limited time. Kids 2+ can play their own nursery rhymes (7 included) & holiday tunes (9 included) by tapping the animals as they pop out of holes in the ground. The app has 3 modes: baby mode (plays the tune correctly no matter which animal is tapped), play mode (tap the animals in the order that they pop up), and freestyle mode (tap the animals in any order to create your own tune). There is an option of changing to a keyboard when you feel your child is ready to make that transition. There are also 9 instrument options – piano, accordion, clarinet, acoustic guitar, xylophone, drum, harmonica, harp, and animal noises! When a tune is completed, all of the animals pop out of their holes to dance as the tune replays. The result is sheer happiness!

Recommended!

Tap A Tune - Mindshapes Limited

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Mindshape Limited – Story Apps

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Hold your hats  – today is going to be a record-setting day for FREE educational apps thanks to Mindshapes Limited! They are offering 18 of their story apps for FREE!!

Little Red Hen

Many of these stories are classic fairy tales. They are nicely illustrated, professionally narrated, and can be enjoyed in four modes: read, watch, learn, and play. So here are links to 18 FREE e-books from the Mindshapes. Enjoy 🙂

Rumpelstiltskin Rumplestiltskin - Mindshapes Limited

Princess and the Pea The Princess and the Pea - A Fairy Tale - Mindshapes Limited

The Boy who Cried Wolf The Boy who Cried Wolf - Mindshapes Limited

The Glass Mountain   The Glass Mountain - Mindshapes Limited

The Leaping Match The Leaping Match - Mindshapes Limited

Ali Babba and the Forty Thieves   Ali Baba & the Forty Thieves - Mindshapes Limited

The Ugly Duckling   Ali Baba & the Forty Thieves - Mindshapes Limited

The Snow Queen The Snow Queen by Hans Christian Andersen - Mindshapes Limited

The Tale of Cinderella   The Tale of Cinderella - Mindshapes Limited

Thumbelina   Thumbelina - A Fairy Tale - Mindshapes Limited

Hansel & Gretel   Hansel and Gretel - Grimm's Fairy Tales - Mindshapes Limited

Nutcracker – Ballet School   Nutcracker - Ballet School Stories - Mindshapes Limited

Aladdin –  The Arabian Nights   Aladdin - The Arabian Nights - Mindshapes Limited

The Little Red Hen  https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-story-of-the-little-red-hen/id583950594?mt=8&uo=4

The Tortoise and the Hare   https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-tortoise-the-hare/id572867513?mt=8&uo=4

Sleeping Beauty   https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/sleeping-beauty-a-fairy-story/id584847816?mt=8&uo=4

Brer Rabbit & the Prickly Patch https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/brer-rabbit-prickly-patch/id578074771?mt=8&uo=4

The Story of the Dog and His Reflection   https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/story-dog-his-reflection/id578072856?mt=8&uo=4

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The Opposites

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FREE again – The Opposites for the iPhone/iPad. Designed for kids 7+, this educational app requires the matching of increasingly difficult pairs of opposite words. There are two sections of the app: dictionary and play. In the dictionary section, words are listed next to their opposites. To learn the meaning, students just tap on the word and a definition appears. There are 10 levels with 100+ words per level. In the play section, words are pronounced by a boy or a girl as they appear in bubbles and float towards the top of the screen  Kids are to tap pairs of opposites as they appear – which makes the words turn a color then pop. The goal is to match 12 sets of opposites  – which completes the level. A bonus round then appears in which the student has 20 seconds to match up an entire  board full of opposites. This app starts off simply but becomes quite challenging in the later levels. It could be used for differentiating a lesson and/or for helping students grow their understanding of antonyms.

Common Core Standards met:

  • 4.L.5 – Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships, and nuances in word meanings. c.Demonstrate understanding of words by relating them to their opposites (antonyms) and to words with similar but not identical meanings (synonyms).
  • 5.L.5 – Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships, and nuances in word meanings. c. Use the relationship between particular words (e.g., synonyms, antonyms, homographs) to better understand each of the words.

Recommended!

The Opposites - Mindshapes Limited

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Jack and the Beanstalk by Mindshapes

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FREE again – Jack and the Beanstalk, an educational 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