Ten digital learning apps for children
Covid-19 has led to closure of learning institutions and consequently led to learners losing a whole academic calendar year. All isn’t lost though, as learners—thanks to the Internet—can still access classes through mobile apps as listed by Clifford Akumu.
Ubongo Kids
Tanzanian edutainment startup Ubongo launched its Math Rats app in 2016 to teach children math skills through interacting with a story.
Also Read:
The app seeks at simplifying the teaching of mathematics to children through fun video stories in Kiswahili, and allows participation via a short message service.
It is an interactive e-book of the most popular episode of the Ubongo Kids television show.
The app allows kids to interact with the story they know and love in new ways, reading it themselves, reading along with a narrator, and solving puzzles and math problems.
It is available for Android, with versions in Kiswahili and English.
Lynda
It entails a variety of courses on various subjects. It also provides the convenience of learning on the go or at home at learners’ speed.
To enjoy the services, the user has to subscribe monthly and enjoy several loads of courses of their liking.
Teach Your Monster to Read
It is an app available on Android, Apple and Amazon. It usually costs £4.99 (Sh667), but has long been made free following the school disruption that has affected most learners globally.
The children gets to create a monster and then teach it to read; a great way of learning themselves.
Montessori Preschool
This beautifully crafted app could be a great help for very young children missing out on some of the formative teaching at preschool. But it comes with a price tag of £5.49 (Sh737) a month.
From phonics and mathematics to music and early coding, its colourful exercises are a huge plus for early learners.
Khan Academy Kids
This is very common with educational content providers in Kenya. It is free on Android, Apple and Amazon.
Khan Academy is a free collection of education courses for all ages, but it has an app specifically for two to seven-year-old children that focuses on reading, mathematics and social and emotional skills.
It offers practice exercises, digital books, instructional videos and a personalised learning dashboard that empower leaners to study at their own pace in and outside of the classroom.
ScratchJr
ScratchJr is an app version designed for five to seven-year-olds, but older children can also have fun with it, too.
It uses coding blocks to create programmes for animation, games, music and other creative tasks.
It is also suitable for those looking for creative projects for young children. It is freely available on Android, Apple and Amazon.
YouTube Kids
This is an official free children’s app made by digital video platform YouTube that provides a more contained environment for children to explore.
It makes it easier for parents and caregivers to guide leaners’ through the learning journey.
It includes a dedicated learning category, collecting great videos about science, nature, space and other topics.
An added advantage is that it has a parental safety control that enables your children to stay on course.
Google Arts and Culture
It is available free on Android and Apple. While field trips and museum visits for learners may be out of bounds for a while due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Google’s Arts and Culture app offers virtual tours of more than 1,200 museums and galleries for learners and those aspiring to become young conservationists.
With this app, children can look and read as well as curate their own lists of favourite artworks to share.
Kahoot!
Kahoot! is an app and a website that has a big collection of trivia quizzes created by other users.
It is available on Android and Apple, and is free and on subscription basis depending on your preferences.
It’s also a good group-learning experience where one person hosts a game and the others compete on their own devices.
Duolingo
This app is suitable for those learners who want to learn a new language. It has courses in Spanish, French and other 12 languages commonly spoken in the world. It uses illustrations of pictures and spoken phrases by native speakers.
