Tag: Apps for Creativity

Age 5, Age 6, Age 7, App Reviews, Augmented Reality, Free Apps, Giveaways, iPad Acessories, Reading

iPad Accessories for Learning and Fun: Review plus GIVEAWAY!!

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ipad accessories for kids Recently I’ve been interested in exploring new ways of interacting with the iPad, seeing how we can move beyond finger to screen interactions and integrate more 3D real world into our regular iPad experience. I was encouraged in this direction by my discovery of Crayola Digitools and soon I discovered there are a number of fabulous 3D resources out there. Each of the products reviewed below is designed to be used with the iPad to enhance our kids’ enjoyment of learning and inspire creative endeavors. Variety is the spice of life right? And a little, no actually a lot, of variety always goes down well with the kids, so anything that changes our routines up a bit and inspires the kids to start thinking and experimenting in a new way is always worth investigating. Plus research has shown that children learn faster when they are required to engage their visual, auditory and tactile senses in an activity. I’ve looked at iPad accessories made by three companies at the forefront of creative and educational iPad innovation: Tiggly, Touchtronic and Crayola. And luckily for us the kind folks at each of these companies has offered Flying Start Kids readers a chance to win some of these fantastic sets for free! Continue reading “iPad Accessories for Learning and Fun: Review plus GIVEAWAY!!” →

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Age 5, Age 6, Age 7, App Reviews, Free Apps

Free App: Toca Nature

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Screen Shot 2015-05-10 at 8.12.41 pmThis beautiful open ended nature play app is Apple’s Free App of the Week. Designed for kids 6-8 but fun for younger kids as well, this app enables them to design their own little world of nature and animals. They are presented with a plain piece of land to which they can add mountains, water and five types of tree. The trees provide habitats for different animals. They can spin the globe in the corner to look at the land from different angles or tap Continue reading “Free App: Toca Nature” →

Free Apps, Music Apps, Toddler Apps

Sanity Savers! Apps and Ideas for Entertaining Toddlers on a Plane

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Entertaining toddlers on a plane.jpg
Entertaining little people on a plane!

I’ve been asked by a few slightly, shall we say… apprehensive parents which apps I would recommend for their 1 or 2 year old to entertain them on a plane journey. I mean really, what are they worried about…? Cue droll laugh. In my mind any flight over about 6 hours with small kids is akin to one of those mad endurance challenges that people put themselves through where they have to crawl through mud for 20 kilometers carrying three tyres on their head or swim under arctic pack ice with no wetsuit. No that is not melodrama, that is… traveling with kids. If you are thinking the in flight entertainment will sort them out, well sorry, they don’t sit and pay attention to that until around age 3 I reckon, when the fact Continue reading “Sanity Savers! Apps and Ideas for Entertaining Toddlers on a Plane” →

Age 5, Co-playing Apps, Music Apps, Preschoolers, Toddler Apps

Bubl Draw: your art makes music!

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I. LOVE. THIS. APP. Which is fairly self evident since I’m posting it on my blog. But I just love it when you come across that happy symbiosis of super fun apps that also promote creativity and curiosity. Plus it’s a fun one for kids and adults to use together and apps that promote co-playing are always a good thing. This app seems pretty simple and well, actually, it is! It is simple to use straight away but rewards deeper investigation. That’s one hallmark of a well designed app in my book.

Bubl Draw is an enhanced drawing app, every mark you make creates music. Experiment with colours, with different areas of the page and with different shapes. All will contribute to a fun composition based on three musical styles: Classic, Disco or Rumba. The instruments naturally complement each other and are always in tune (thankfully).

Both my kids (age 2 and 4) love this one and have even been known to play it together. For a short time… let’s not set expectations too high here! I enjoy playing it with them too but they definitely love to take charge with their own compositions!

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App Reviews, Toddler Apps

Paint My Wings – beautiful apps for Toddlers

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Paint My Wings - beautiful apps for Toddlers

I love apps that encourage creativity and don’t necessarily have exact answers to input. This app is delightful, again no distracting music or flashy visuals, just the occasional hello! or giggle from a butterfly as you paint its wings with a simple variety of squishy fruit paints and brushes. One of Cool A’s favourites. The makers of this app, Toca Boca make top notch kids apps. Be sure to do a search for them on the App Store.