Kids Iphone App Review
Our kids test them, we review them!

I like my kids to read books. My ten year old has been out of school for one day and has read five books. She loves to read. My four year old is just figuring reading out. She likes stories, but not the process of reading. She needs something to keep her interested in the book.

Scott’s Submarine by Square Igloo nails it. With great graphics, a treasure hunt during the book, a simple feature where she can take photos during the book, and a fun simple story it makes a great app. Some of the pages even extend downward where some extend left to right. A great use of the device(s). Why make it just one page?

The video I made of this app was about 5 minutes long so I cut it up but my four year old was playing with the book 20 minutes later. A good sign for sure!

There are all sorts of interesting features in this book and I can see my four year old learning to read this book as her first book ever. Well, I think just to be consistent we will have hear learn Dick and Jane like I did and her older sister did

Attention – 5
Learning – 4
Fun – 4
Total – 13

We have come to love The Going To Bed Book Sandra Boynton Loud Crow Interactive. It is a neat book to read just before bed. Initially I wasn’t impressed with the voice, but realized that it is a very soothing voice for my daughter. She still gets to play with the characters as we have come to be accustomed to.

The book does a great job of getting you ready for bed. The characters all do the normal pre-bed tasks. You interact with them and my favorite part is the screen fogging up. A neat book by a great author narrated in a very appropriate manner.

Attention – 5
Fun – 3
Learning – 4

Total – 12

We really like Tap to Learn. They create some great apps. Spelling With Friends is another good app. Not only can you spell with friends, but the app has some real learning potential. It isn’t perfect, but I think they can get it right.

The app has a lot of words. I mean a lot. I was shocked when I first heard the words she was asked to learn. As she played with the app more and more she really felt challenged by the learning experience. She did good, but man the words are hard to learn sometimes.

The app isn’t perfect. The app list is very long but it doesn’t seem to have a way to filter the words. There aren’t categories or anything like that. The testing is a positive since it provides a nice feedback to the user. It is like a spelling bee. You can check the definition and origin and see the word used in a sentence. Good things, but when it is used in a sentence you see how to spell it. Setting some scruples aside, as kids are quick to do, you can figure out the words quickly. In the challenge a friend mode I could just have a dictionary next to me and cheat. Just saying.

So not perfect, but since we are all involved parents, this is a solid spelling app with many, many words. I am sure the people at Tap to Learn will release an update to address some of the small issues and the filtering of words.

Attention – 5
Learning – 5
Fun – 2

Total – 12. It isn’t fun, but it is learning. Buy the app

Check out my daughter playing and learning:

Sometimes it is easier to get your child to play a game then it is to get them to learn. It can also be true that you want your child to learn in a few different ways. Counting numbers, reciting numbers, and counting backwards can be fun, but it abstract counting can be fun too. What do I mean by abstract counting?

Sam Phibian By 3CD gets your child to count and learn numbers by getting Sam Phibian the amphibian to eat a certain number of flies. It is fun, interesting to young children and makes them think about the colors and flies they have already gotten Sam to eat.

I suppose it also teaches hand eye coordination, abstract thinking, as well as number skills, but really it is a fun way to eat flies and act like a frog. Does it work? Yep. I just told my four year old to eat the number of colored flies shown at the bottom of the screen and she was off. She likes to get Sam to wear funny hats and be goofy, but she also gets the counting part too.

Fun – 5
Learning – 4 (you really only learn one thing, but that is ok)
Attention – 4

Total – 13

Check out my four year old and I playing with the app:

ABC Aliens HD by Cambridge English Online ltd. is a fun but really challenging ABC learning game. The idea is you have four games to play where you are asked to find the letters of the alphabet within 30 seconds. You can do it in upper and lower case and backwards.

Is the game fun? Yes it is. Does it teach the alphabet? Sure, it can work as a tool to do that. One of the choices is to have the alphabet read to you by an alien or a child’s voice. The alien voice is silly, but clear, and my daughter liked that.

My four year old knows the letters of the alphabet upper and lower case pretty well. She confuses d and b sometimes, but knows the letters pretty well. In this app she had a hard time getting the letters in 30 seconds. In the video she had a hard time getting 4 letters in that amount of time. As we played with the app more and more she could get further, but never all of the letters. It takes me 26 seconds. The backwards version is fun and makes for some interesting group gameplay.

Fun – 3 (it is mainly a learning app, but it is fun too)
Learning – 4 (it is a supplement to other alphabet learning tools)
Attention – 2 (your child will not want to play with the app for more than 10 minutes at a time)

Total – 9

Moo Baa La La La by Loud Crow is another great book from Loud Crow Interactive. It has interactive characters, a simple story line, and my imaginative four year old loves it. My ten year old likes to make noise with it, but she reads it to her younger sister too.

These books by Sandra Boynton are simple fun stories. On the iPad or iPhone they become interactive, fun, and alive. Does it last forever? No. Are they attention keepers? yes.

In Moo Baa La La La by Loud Crow your child gets to learn the sounds that animals make while providing a learning experience. You can click on each word to have it repeated and as the words are read each is highlighted. I really consider those must-haves in these book/apps. I want my daughter to click each word and learn to recognize the sight words as soon as she can. I believe this leads to early “reading” or at least reading by recognizing the words on the page together.

This book was recommended by a reader and friend and it does not disappoint. In his case he reads it to his 3 year old. I have it read by the app to my four year old and I bet it is good for another year!

Attention – 5
Fun – 4
Learning – 4

Total – 13 – pretty good. If you are looking for a book/app for your child you cannot go wrong. iPad and iPhone version available.

Check out a video of my daughter playing with the book/app. She opened it again this morning and played for another hour!

Just Fractions by Smiley Cat Software is an awesome fractions app. It does a great job of filling the fractions piece of your child’s math learning. It is a fractions calculator, fractions quizzer, a fractions tool!

Seaghan developed the app when he was in 5th grade! It seems when you play with the app you can tell that he was giving the student what he needed in class. It works. It works really well. Seaghan’s dad did some of the programming, but Seaghan did about half. You can read the details in the app. Very impressive and he has won several awards!

My ten year likes the app and found it to be very useful. I find it to be hard You do have a three levels to choose from so I suppose I will get better as I learn more about fractions. Can your child learn from it? Yes for sure. It has an great way of getting the student to answer correctly and allowing for things like proper fractions and a complete reduction. (important stuff).

Attention – 4
Learning – 5
Fun – 0 (this is a learning app!)

Total – 9