For some reason I think boys might enjoy Thomas & Friends: Engine Activities By Callaway Digital Arts, Inc. more than girls just because, well, Thomas is a train I guess, but my daughter still loves the app and game.

Is it typical that Thomas & Friends: Engine Activities By Callaway Digital Arts, Inc. would b so popular? Is it an easy formula to come up with a great activity app? It seems not. The activities in Thomas & Friends: Engine Activities By Callaway Digital Arts, Inc. are similar to those activities you would find in a traditional coloring book, puzzle, and matching game set. Three in one!

Attention – 4
Learning – 3
Fun – 4

Total – 11

If course we love the Big Grips iPad case. Be sure to check it out:

After you pick your photos the book begins and as you probably guessed, it uses your photos in the book. My four year old was very happy to see her own face in the book. She has seen apps like this before and they are always a big hit. This Christmas twist just makes it that much more fun.

Outside the novelty of picking your own faces the other faces in the book are a cute addition. They book is well done in tradition Oceanhouse Media format. I prefer this narrator to others for some reason and I can tell my four year old does too. I have a feeling Picture Me Christmas Cutie By Oceanhouse Media is an app that will remain on the iPad so that we can revisit it each Christmas. We have already went through the book about five times and will probably do it a few more times as different people come to visit over the holidays.

Fun – 5
Attention – 5
Learning – 1 (my four year old did learn to select the image and rotate it. She is working on her fine motor skills, so this counts!)

Total – 11

Of course we housed our ipad in the Big Grips iPad Frame. We love it and would never leave home without it.

We are pretty sure our ten year old has stopped believing in Santa, but our four year old is still a strong believer. This app sure can help that belief stay alive. As a parent I was able to add both of my children and naughty or nice. I was able to take a photo of my living room and show Santa appearing and delivering some presents! It is amazingly realistic.

Santa’s Big Helper: 9 Christmas Apps in 1 By Wet Nose Design Ltd is a fun app for kids to track Santa too! You can tell where he is at this moment and when he is to arrive. Personally I would skip the elf videos. I was a bit put off by the character, but the kids seemed to think it was funny enough.

Parental settings (to take videos and add children) are password protected, so set your kids free on the Santa’s Big Helper: 9 Christmas Apps in 1 By Wet Nose Design Ltd app!.

Your older child can even write a letter to Santa! My ten year old was not willing to participate, but it looks like a neat way to digitize that wish list!

Attention – 5 (for a few more days!)
Fun – 4
Learning – 0

Total – 9

Of course The Night Before Christmas – Enchanted Tales By Oceanhouse Media has the usual outstanding images, narration, and story of all Oceanhouse books, but this time with an engaging story that I was not familiar with. I suppose I could have chosen the read it myself option and explored the book before I presented it to my four year old, but together we got lost in the story of the toy factory, the orphans, and the few antagonists.

The Night Before Christmas – Enchanted Tales By Oceanhouse Media is another book from Oceanhouse that you can choose to sit down and explore with your child, read it to them, have it read to them while they choose to turn the pages, or in “back seat mode” as I call it, you can have it self play. Together with a nice iPad Frame/case/stand like the Big Grips iPad Frame the “back seat mode” could be used to fall asleep to.

Can your child learn to read with The Night Before Christmas – Enchanted Tales By Oceanhouse Media? Perhaps not. But they can learn to LOVE to read. One of the benefits of reading a book to your child is that they learn the style of reading, the cadence, the pace, the stopping points, and the narration is key. You get all of the various forms of reading styles with this and many of the books from Oceanhouse Media.

Attention – 5
Fun – 3 (it is a book!)
Learning – 3 (there are some lessons in this book that are clearer to me)

Total – 11. A very good book. A must have.

The animations and drawings are done in a typical Dr. Seuss style, but with less color. I almost felt like I had downloaded a copy of the book before it was sent overseas to be colored I bet that is not the case and instead is meant to match the overall style of the original.

How The Grinch Stole Christmas! – Dr. Seuss By Oceanhouse Media is a classic Christmas book, story, movie, and now app. Just having the book to enjoy on a cold winter night makes the purchase worth it. I haven’t given it a try, but showing the app on a flat screen with the whole family via HDMI might make for some new traidtions!

Fun – 2 (it is a book)
Attention – 4
Learning – 3

Total – 9

Of course we watch the whole book in the best frame we have found for the iPad2 – the Big Grips iPad Frame. We love the case. Just yesterday (when the video below was recorded) our four year old was walking into the kitchen with the iPad in her case as it always is. She hit the doggy gate and nearly dropped the iPad! If not for the awesome grip the Frame provides the iPad would have been on the ground. We have a tile floor and without the case it would certainly have dented the iPad at least. I bet with the case it would not have even mattered.

In typical and awesome Oceanhouse Media fashion, Tacky’s Christmas By Oceanhouse Media is very well written, narrated very pleasantly, and has just enough interactivity to keep my four year old interested. She knows that she can click on each object to hear and see the word it represents. She can hold a paragraph to have it repeated, but rarely does. Swiping the pages is the most fun it seems and she gets really upset if you turn the page early! A sure sign of a good book.

Watch the video for a taste of what Tacky’s Christmas By Oceanhouse Media has to offer. Will your child learn to read in this format? I am not too sure, but I am confident this format will work as a good reinforcement to other reading activities.

Attention – 4
Fun – 3 (it is a book not a game)
Learning – 4

Total – 11

iTunes link

It is great to read/watch/play with these books when you have such a great iPad stand and frame. be sure to check out the Name Your Link. We love ours.

i Learn with Poko: Additions! by Tribal Nova asks your child to “add” by simply counting the objects on the screen. Once they have an idea of how many objects were knocked down, or selected, your child can pick the correct number from the bottom of the screen. Is it easy? Sure. Effective? I bet it is.

Our four year old has no trouble with the game, but does not yet understand that she is adding numbers. Instead she sees it as a counting game, which is ok too. It just might be a bit misleading if you are actually trying to teach your child to add 2+2 and get 4. Instead this app does not provide your child with the numeric representation of the numbers to be added, so traditional addition that they might encounter in kindergarten isn’t accomplished. Still it is a fun learning app for sure.

Attention – 4
Fun – 3
Learning – 5

Total – 12

As always we have our iPad2 covered with the wonderful Big Grips iPad Frame to keep our iPad2 safe. We love this frame!

Website Link

The story of Pinocchio is familiar, but the way the book is performed is a big factor in the success of an app. Pinocchio HD By So Ouat does an outstanding job of telling the traditional story of Pinocchio.

The written word is done really well in this book, but it does not give the option to click on individual words. My daughter rarely uses that feature, so I do not care so much, but it is a nice feature of other apps/books.

The animations and books is where Pinocchio HD By So Ouat really shines. The animations are just great. They make the book seem like a still movie.

My four year old was not excited to read the book again since she had been through it a few times. Once we got the app going and she got into the story she finished the book again. I can see her reading this many times over the coming years.

Attention – 4
Fun – 3
Learning – 2

Total – 9

iTunes Link

Of course we have our ipad covered with the Big Grips iPad2 frame and stand. We love that think!

The choices of things to color is very extensive. I haven’t counted, but there must be over a hundred different pages to color in the app. Of course you can color a single page over and over again, but choosing which page to color is half the fun!

My four year old had no trouble with the app and enjoyed the experience a lot. I think the app is really suited for a younger audience, but it should span all the way up to a 5 year old or so. Sometimes it is more fun to actually swipe your finger to color, but other times you want an app like Animals Coloring by theColor.com that just uses the paint bucket to do the dirty work!

Attention = 5
Learning = 2
Fun = 2

Total = 9

iTunes Link

Be sure to check out the video for the whole experience and as always note the Big Grips iPad Frame. We took that case to a restaurant the other day, to a gymnastics competition, and over to grandma’s house. We love it!

So I opened up the iPad and searched for an opposites app. I ran across ZOOLA Opposites By Best kids Apps for 99 cents. I spent way too long on the decision and purchased the app. Ten minutes later my four year old can name several opposites. Did the app work? Yep.

How long did my four year old spend on the app? Probably 10 minutes a few times in a row. Is it a single use app? Yes it is. Does it do a good job at its single task? Yes it does.

Attention – 3
Fun – 0
Learning – 5

Total – 8

iTunes Link