I recently find a great educational app from Smithsonian – Smithsonian Channel. It has many of Smithsonian channel’s videos, some are full episodes, and they are free! It is available on almost all the different devices, iPhone, iPod, iPad, Android, Kindle. If you want to watch the videos on bigger screen, it is also available on their website, so you can watch the shows on your computer. I loved Smithsonian, and I simply can’t believe I can watch Smithsonian Channel… Read more

Matching Games by CosmoCamp is a simple yet entirely engrossing game for kids that teaches memory skills along with learning colors, shapes, numbers, and letters.  It comes with two different modes, toddler and preschool, to grow with your child, chosen each time you open the app or easily changeable in the parents only area of the app. The matching app has three games:  Classic, Hide and Seek, and Pyramid.  In Classic, kids can choose to have from 8-18 cards from which they… Read more

Today I have a book app to share with you: Just a Little Music by Mercer Mayer. Mercer Mayer is the author of the Little Critter books. Little Critter is the main character and is a furry little character that resembles a porcupine or hedgehog, however the author has never identified what exact animal he is. His first book dates back all the way to 1975 so he has been around a while. It’s great to see storybooks from my… Read more

Recently I found a wonderful free resource from National Geographic for kids – National Geographic Young Explorer Magazine. It is available for free on their website, and as apps for both iPad and Android devices. There are 7 issues every year. Each issue covers 3 topics about nature, such as rain; plant roots; animals cover – fur, feather, and scales. Each page is mostly a big image with one line of text. The images are stunning. Kids can choose to… Read more

There is a Polar Bear and a Panda Bear named Migo and Pandy who both love to play dress up.  If your kids are in the 2-3 toddler range or in the 3-5 pre-school range, they’re going to love to play dress up with Migo and Pandy too. What is even better, you won’t see all your clothes spread all over the places. They are neatly organized on your iPad. In this sweet, slow moving app there are fewer bells and… Read more

Over the weekend I was playing with a fun app called Fiete. It is a very different kind of picture book for kids of all ages. As the introduction on the App Store says, it is “an alternative to interactive children’s book: in a playful way, with attention to details”. I call it an interactive game picture book. When kids open the app, they will see a friendly sailor Fiete waving to them and inviting them to play. Scroll the… Read more

The Witch With No Name is a 3D interactive digital book app for kids and the whole family. It tells the story of a witch, who doesn’t know her name, tries to find her name. It is a funny story, but the best parts are the interactive features built in the story. I love how the app engage kids in the activities throughout the story. The whole production of the app is superb, especially the interactions on each page. There… Read more

Are you kids doing GeoBee? My child’s school just finished their GeoBee challenge for this year. It is a fun way for kids to learn geography. GeoBee Challenge App is a great tool to help kids prepare for the challenge. If your child has not done GeoBee, it is like the Spelling Bee, but it is all about geographic information. Each year thousands of students in grades 4 through 8 in the United States participate in the National Geographic Bee… Read more

Do you like to read poems? Do you read poems with your kids? Poetry for kids has been my recent interest. The love of poetry is a cultured taste that needs be cultivated from a young age. I found the best way to engage a child in poetry is to find the subject that they are interested in, and share when they are in the mood for at the moment.  I find a free app from The Poetry Foundation can… Read more

If you are looking for a fun way for kids to learn their times tables or math facts in general then, you will be interested in our recent discovery. Math Slicer, by Thumb storm, turns kids into Math ninjas. It is a fun math game for math facts. On opening, the app players can choose to work with Multiplication, division, addition or subtraction. Each operation shows a visual list of fact families to practice. During game play, math facts will… Read more

Does you child like to play hide and seek? Now they can have the fun on iPad too. Monki Hide and Seek is a fun game app designed for kids 2 to 6. Kids learn to follow instructions, to recognize animal names and sounds, while looking for the hiding animals. It is a fun game app for the rainy or snowy days. The game play of the app is very simple. When kids start the app, they can choose one of the… Read more

Is fraction a hard concept to learn? The basic concept may be not, but when it comes to comparison and calculation, it can get very confusing sometime. What is a better way to teach and reinforce the fraction concept than playing games? Today I am sharing cool math games of fractions: Slice Fractions. It is also the number 1 featured app on App Store for Best New Apps. What is interesting about Slice Fractions is that it combines math and… Read more

Have you been watching Winter Olympics? We are. Watching sport events together offers opportunities for families to talk about a lot interesting subjects that are way beyond sports.  Subjects like Olympic history, inspirations, hard works, team spirit, success and failures, even cultural and customs. Winter Olympics Learning Resources for Kids If you are looking for talking topics and things to do with kids around Winter Olympics, I hope you will find the books and entertainments I listed here are helpful… Read more

Learning numbers and counting are the first steps of learning math.  The more different approaches of learning, the better kids understand the concept, and the easier of future math learning.  That is why I like the app Count Up to 10. It offers various number games for kids to help them learn numbers. There are 4 sets of games in the app, each set has 3 levels. The Penguins: help children connect the number symbol with the actually quantity. At the first… Read more