High-quality apps you can feel good about using with your child.
Librarians have been giving advice about how to make choices in media forever! Books, music, movies... Apps are simply another form of media to hit the market and for families that are choosing to use apps with their kids, it can feel overwhelming deciding which apps to choose.
There are a number of great resources about using apps with kids. Here are a few favorites:
- Family Time with Apps
- Apps en Familia
- iPad apps and your Pre-Reader
- Tips for using screen media with young children from Zero to Three
Read to start browsing apps? Check out our most recent app reviews below:
A deceptively simple game of flicking circles across a divided field. You can choose the two player or four player mode, then take turns bouncing a circle across the screen. You can slide it slowly and hope that your circle lands on your opponent's side safely. You can slide it fast and watch it bounce off the edges and other circles and see if it lands where you want it to or whether it…
Create a unique juice blend then watch what silly things happen when your favorite Sago Mini characters drink them! First, choose the basic juice and cup shape. Next, choose from six different machines that can alter the juice by adding different colors (you've got to try rainbow!), blending in some new ingredients (often fruits and veggies, but with some silly stuff thrown in for fun…
A digital card game for one or two players, somewhat like the card game Set. In this game, you first choose the card images you want to play with from 8 options (or design your own images!). Then the table is set with two sets of three cards. When it's your turn, your aim is to make your trio of cards have all elements the same or all elements different (e.g. all the same shape, all…
Winner of the very first Excellence in Early Learning Digital Media Award, an American Library Association award! This app by PBS Kids features five different play areas -- water, shadows, weather, ramps and "gear up" -- with three games or activities in each area. The water section is especially fun as you get to try different arrangements of elements to direct the flow of water down a…
Help a tiny floating ball of light travel through dark tunnels and reconnect with all of its light-ball friends. If you go too long without finding a new friend to recharge your light with, your light will fade out and you'll be returned to the beginning of that maze or to the last orange flower that blossomed along your path. This app is darker and moodier than all of the rest of the apps by…
Explore three different play areas in Fiete's World. At the time of this review there are three areas -- the farm / house, the lighthouse island and pirate's island (there are plans for more areas in the future!). Characters can move between the different areas by boat or piloting a helicopter. Players can change character's hats, cook foods and try out any activity that comes to…
The tiniest car racing game ever! Also, one of the few games that 11 people can play on one iPad screen at the same time (are there others? I can't think of many). In this simple game, choose your race course, choose the color of car you want, then as soon as the starting signal sounds, everyone controls their car by using their colored "button" as a joystick or touchpad,…
If you enjoy silly stuff, slapstick humor and a bit of surrealism, then this is the PERFECT app for you. Chuchel is a small orange dust ball who would really love to be able to eat a cherry that's as big as his head (well, his whole body, really). Sadly, other characters and circumstances keep separating him from his precious fruit. Travel through this app with Chuchel, playing mini-…
Visit a virtual zoo with Sago Mini! In this app, users can explore different areas of the zoo (bamboo forest, jungle, arctic, gift shop, vet's office, zookeeper's shed), picking up the animals and taking them to different areas, trying hats on them from the gift shop, buying drinks from the vending machine, swinging on the banana swing, packing some animal feed into the zookeeper's Jeep…
Become a sushi chef with digital toy maker, Toca Boca! In this app, players choose which foods they want to incorporate into their sushi -- some expected ingredients like fish, other oddball ingredients like candy canes. Next, they choose which kitchen tools they want to use -- knife, frying pan, rice cooker/food shaper or rolling mat. Preparing the food takes a little trial and error the…
A point-and-click adventure game for older players. Robert is a wind monk's apprentice who finds himself on an adventure. Players help guide him through the adventure, tapping where they want him to walk or tapping on objects or characters they want him to interact with. There are lots of clues to uncover and you must use the objects you find (or combine them together) to solve the puzzles.…
In this surreal game, you ARE the hole. Donut County has a hole problem. Large holes keep opening up all over the place and everything (I mean EVERYTHING) is getting swallowed up. In this app for older users (at least old enough to read fluently as the app has a lot of text and no narrator options), your job is to move the hole around the screen so that everything falls in. The more things…