A dose of reality – iPads and tablets are pretty much essential kit to get you through a long period at home with kids (ok maybe an exaggeration – but they help keep us sane if they give you a bit of time back!) but I always agonise on whether I’m doing the right thing for my kids.. how much screen time is too much and is watching youtube videos of people opening up kinder surprise eggs going to do any long term damage to their IQ?!
If we can make it educational then it will help right??
So for those of you looking for some educational apps to support your child’s learning this summer, we have pulled together some recommendations from your fellow Mumblers with 10 apps that can aid your child in both numeracy and literacy. If you have any more great ones to add then please let us know by e-mailing [email protected] We’d love to hear from you!
Eggy 100
Recommended Age: 3 years +
Price: Free (Google Play and App Store)
Description: This app is designed to help children learn sight words. These are words that don’t follow the usual patterns so children are taught to recognise them automatically as they would be difficult to decode in the way they usually do with phonics.
Endless alphabet
Recommended Age: 4-10 years
Price: Free to try followed by in-app purchase (Google Play)/£8.99 (App Store)
Description: This app has over 50 words for your child to interact with. They can learn new words and spellings by dragging letters into the correct order, each time unleashing adorable monster animations.
Hairy Letters
Recommended Age: 4-6 years
Price: £2.99 (Google Play and App Store)
Description: Children can learn letters and spellings through interactive games and animated characters. Games include tracing over letters as well as dragging them into an order to form simple words.
Kids Corner
Recommended Age: 1-5 years
Price: Free (Google Play)
Description: This is a first words app for toddlers and children. Children can learn new words and spellings through simple games.
Teach Your Monster to Read
Recommended Age: 4-7 years
Price: £4.99 (Google Play and App Store)
Description: Kids create a monster and take them on a journey that teaches them to read. This app covers the first two years of learning to read from recognising letters to enjoying stories.
Starfall
Recommended Age: Under 8’s
Price: Free – Can purchase membership (Google Play and App store)
Description: This app provides a sample of free activities when connected to the internet. You can gain full access to the content by purchasing a membership. Starfall incorporates both maths and reading at different levels to suit your child.
DoodleMaths: Primary Maths
Recommended Age: 4-14 years
Price: Free (Google Play and App store)
Description: DoodleMaths can help your child with their mathematics skills from reception all the way through to preparing for their GCSE’s through personalised work programmes to help boost their confidence.
Dragonbox Numbers
Recommended Age: 4-9 years
Price: £5.99 (Google Play)/£7.99 (App Store)
Description: This app is a fun and easy introduction to the world of maths, teaching your child how numbers work and what can be done with them.
Monkey Math School Sunshine
Recommended Age: 3-6 years
Price: £1.89 (Google Play)/£1.99 (App Store)
Description: This app has 9 fun beach-themed games to aid your child about counting, adding, subtracting, patterning and sequencing. The games instinctively adjust to suit your child’s current level and kids can collect rewards in an animated aquarium.
123 Basic Number Counting Math Games – EduMath1 Kids
Recommended Age: Under 8’s
Price: Free (Google Play and App Store)
Description: This colourful app is designed to introduce the basics of maths and built your child’s confidence using games to enhance skills such as number recognition, adding & subtracting and sorting. Available in 12 languages.