A friend requested some help with locating learning apps for her pre-schooler, so I surfed through the Google App Store for a look at some Android apps to direct her to. Here is a list of free apps I have tried in the last week or so. I am not recommending any of them 🙁

• Pickles Maths by Michael Beverley
  For kids who are ready for addition facts. This will give a bulk order of addition problems but, oh, the painful repetition. Yes, I know little kids need/like repetition but this is relentless and nothing breaks the monotony. There might be a few kids into this but I think not very many.
• Funny Maths by ?
  Colourful images but essentially boring. Use of language is clumsy.
• Kids Learning by SunMoon Bytes
  OK I guess if you just want semi Flash cards but not chosen with any real insight and it doesn’t do anything except show a series of pictures on a theme. No chance for any interaction. No navigation at all built in.
• Kids Coloring by SoosApps
  A standard touch to colour app. The virtual crayons are in very close proximity to the ad banner at the bottom of the screen. Not cool.
• Kids numbers and math games (My Baby Island) by gtsoft
  A good range of activities but fullscreen ads are a turn off.  Many of the activities have no instructions and it is not at all apparent what you are supposed to do. It crashed a few times for me.
• Kids Math by ?
  A good range of activities but fullscreen ads are a turn off. Spelling mistake on the main menu is bad. Many of the activities have no instructions.

I don’t think that these are particularly bad apps; I just randomly selected a few apps with at least reasonable ratings. I found that all of them unengaging- e.g. no motivating storyline involved, no clear spoken instructions, little attention to detail in many cases. I will try some more but will be making use of some specialist review sites to inform my choices. This search for criteria is going to be a long one I think.