July 24 - Under the Sea

Bright World Adventures' ebook, Ocean Forests is more than an ebook. In today's storytime, we began with reading the story that informs children about Giant Kelp. We choose the Read by Myself option, although we could of set it to Read to Me with highlighted text. We watched the realistic 3D life-like animation in the background. After the story, the children were able to explore on their own using the built in scavenger hunt activity. This mode of exploring allowed children to pan, focus move left and right and up and down and touch the different things they saw on screen to learn more about what they saw in the kelp forest. (iOS)

Marco Polo's Ocean app is a child-friendly app designed for young children to explore the ocean. There are puzzles to learn and identify the different parts of ocean dwellers or parts of a boat and a submersible. In addition to the puzzle mode, the children can also explore a vast ocean scenery.  (iOS)

We use this app to simply practice writing letters or our word of the day with a stylus. The app is by Game Maker Video and Photo and Emoji for Basketball Kids, LLC.
The app provides a variety of "paper" styles, colors and writing pencils. The paper styles include: ruled with or without dotted line, blank, graph, etc.  Tapping the pencil in the upper left corner allows for change of pencil styles from no. 2 style pencil to a colored pencil. Or, one can tap the eraser to erase parts of the page or choose the trash can to delete the whole page. To set the wrist guard, click the pencil and scroll down to the setting. There is a a choice of half page or quarter page.


Songs:
"The Goldfish" by The Laurie Berkner Band
"Under the Sea" by Samuel E. Wright from Disney's The Little Mermaid.

July 10 - I Can Be an Engineer!

Robot Party
by SagoMini

Robot Factory
by Tinybop

Robot Party by SagoMini is a great app for young preschoolers 3+ years. It's easy to use, has predictability. It's silly and entertaining and can be used to teach cause and effect and provide hours of silliness and creative exploration. It was a hit in today's storytime.

For preschoolers 4+ years and ready to experiment in a completely opened-ended way, choose Robot Factory by Tinybop. This robot exploration provides little guidance so your child can be a fearless inventor. Create a robot and then send it off to see how it fairs in an outdoor environment. If your robot is destroyed...it's back to the lab for more tinkering. Great for young curious minds determined to succeed.

Build with Grandpa by
Fairlady Media

This series of apps by Fairlady Media provides children with active play and education. Grandpa guides your child in a mostly structured process to, in this case, build a house. It includes wrecking an old building and building a new one. clearing the land, designing and painting and using different building tools. Each time your child plays through the process, your child is presented with a slightly different experience. For example, your child will see a different video, or interact with a new construction tool. This makes it fun to keep coming back.


Stories read-aloud today:
Rosie Revere, Engineer by Andrea Beatty, illustrated by David Roberts

Songs: "Technology Song for Kids" & "Doby Wop-The Robot Song" by The Polkadots

June 26 Big Adventures in Reading!

3D Build and Play
by Croco Studios

Experience 21st century mobile learning through playing with this 3D app. The 3D app helps young children observe, explore and discover how vehicles move. Promote early literacy skills by helping children find the words to describe what they are doing and experiencing. For added oral skills let the child make up a story as they control the animated vehicle in virtual space.



Stories read aloud today:
Secret Agent Man Goes Shopping for Shoes by Tim Wynne-Jones and illustrated by Brian Won
Chicken in Space by Adam Lehrhaupt, illus. by Shahar Kobar

June 12 Let's sort our shoes!

 These apps by Tinyhands Apps help children sort and classify by color, shape, among additional challenges, like angles. The app is fun and well-paced within the different levels. The images are colorful and appealing. Some of the sorting practice represents "real world" encounters which helps a child understand real world relationships. Price: $6.99

Books:
My Own Shoes by Sue Fleiss and illustrated by Mike Longhead
Shoes by Elizabeth Winthrop, illus. by William Joyce

Song:
"Walkin' Shoes" by "Miss Carole" Stephens

May 22 the /ch/ sound

  Lil' Writer by Alligator App

The Little Writer app is so customizable! Today, I added our word of the day, "chair" and other words I use that start with "ch" and recorded my voice saying the ch words. I selected capital letters only, but I could have easily chosen all lower case, or even first letter capitalized and the rest lowercase. The app lets you add your own image too. What I appreciate is that each letter name is spoken before the child traces it and than the word is spoken after the all the letters are completed.

Writing Wizard by L'escapadou

Another tracing letter app that is sure to keep your child coming back for more letter recognition and writing. Lots of color and movement to keep a curious young one interested in discovering the shapes of letters. The app has a variety of font styles including D'Nealian for children planning to learn cursive writing. The app also includes numbers too. 

Books:
There's a Bear on My Chair by Ross Collins
Meeow and the Little Chairs by Sebastian Braun

Song:
"Dancing Bear" by Bari Koral

May 8 - Theme: Dogs

I only had time to use my go to app today:

ABC Magnetic Alphabet

by DotNext

This is the app I always start out with to have children play with letters and also sounds of the letters. The great thing about this app is that you will never run out of letters...or lose them!

Books:

This Book is Out of Control by Richard Byrne

Simon's Bed by Christian Trimmer

Song: My Dog Rags

April 24 - Cats

Stories:

Standard Apps:

Magnetic Alphabet