Pre-K app review

Since my kids are preschool age (2 and 4) I thought I’d do a review of some of my favourite educational pre-K apps:

• Monkey Math School – my kids both love this app. I wonder if my 2 year old is actually learning anything or if he is just playing (at this point I really only expect him to start to be able to recognize numbers though), but I’ve really noticed that my 4 year old is starting to learn addition and subtraction. They can play on their own, but they get more out of it when we play together:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/monkey-math-school-sunshine/id451287325?mt=8

• BrightStart Pre-K Letters & Numbers – great app for learning to write letters and numbers, and to recognize different letter sounds.
http://www.brightstartapps.com

• ABC ZooBorns – my 2 year old loves this app and he plays with it all the time. Baby animals are featured from zoos and aquariums from around the world while introducing kids to letters.
http://itunes.apple.com/app/abc-zooborns/id543646069?mt=8%3Futm_source%3Dsidebar_sshott

 

The iPad is so easy to use, that my kids can easily find any app, movie, game that they want to find, and so keeping them on task with these educational apps when I want them to be learning can be a challenge. A great new upgrade from iOS6 is Guided Access which keeps kids on task and lets you control what they are doing on the iPad. Here are some instructions on how to do this:

http://osxdaily.com/2012/09/25/enable-guided-access-ios/
Enabling “Kid Mode” in iOS6 with Guided Access
• Open “Settings” and tap on “General”
• Navigate to “Accessibility” and under the Learning section tap on “Guided Access”
• Flip the switch to ON, then tap “Set Passcode” to set a password you’ll use to escape out of Guided Access mode
• Choose whether or not to Enable Screen Sleep, turning it ON will help sustain battery life when the iPad, iPod, or iPhone is left inactive
• Now that Guided Access is configured, you can use it to lock the iOS device into any app you want.

Finally, when giving something as expensive as an iPad to young children you are taking a risk for sure. I see the benefits as outweighing the risk (especially on an airplane or when waiting in line, at a restaurant, etc) but I invested in a top notch case: OtterBox Heavy Duty Defender iPad Case. Someone told me that you could run it over with your car and your iPad would remain in one piece. I haven’t tested that out to be sure and I have no plans to do so, but I can report that it helped my iPad withstand a toss down the stairs with no damage.

Posted in: Week 05: