"Mom, can I use the tablet?" It's a request I get at least once a day in our house. My kids do love technology.
As parents, we want to make sure that tablet time is spent mainly engaging with high-quality learning apps. Finding those apps that are worth the screen time can be challenging. The options are overwhelming and many of the choices miss the mark when it comes to skill development.
Below are five apps that are worth putting on your tablet for your 4-7 year-old kids to use. They are all designed for beginning readers to work on phonics and sight word recognition.
1. Hale's Tale is the newest app addition to our tablet. Your child will learn to recognize letter sounds, read simple words, and identify sight words in ongoing practice games. An added benefit is that this app is not overstimulating.
2. Teach Your Monster to Read is the absolute favorite app in our house at the moment. Your child teaches their own friendly monster to read through a blend of phonics and sight word games. The app is well-balanced between practice and engaging play.
3. Sight Words allows you to customize words to practice during use of the app. Your kids can switch between the learning section and game section. The games include hangman, memory match, and word whack.
4. Starfall provides an abundance of leveled practice for beginning readers through independent readers. Your child will enjoy playing word games and reading leveled stories. The app is well organized allowing your child to choose areas to visit each session.
5. Hooked on Phonics Learn to Read provides your young reader practice with making words, building words, reading words, and reading stories. Another feature of this app is that each letter sound is presented as a short musical clip. You will find excellent systematic phonics support for your beginning readers.
The next time your kids ask for tablet time, you can feel good knowing they are interacting with one of these enjoyable and educational apps developed to build their reading skills.