School is just around the corner, and with parents facing tough economic times, they want to make every penny spent on back-to-school gadgets count. Here are some of the year's best, plus a few that are perhaps not quite ready for every student's book bag.
Preschool
Tag Junior ($34.95) is the latest literacy product from Leapfrog. Like last year's Tag system for older kids, this one features age appropriate books for preschoolers that are “read” with a chunky "wand" that kids use to interact with the books. Each book, constructed out of heavy cardboard, has over one hundred “interactions”: pictures, text, and games. One of the things I like most about this system is that the book, and the experience of sharing time reading a book, is still front and center. It doesn't try to replace book time, it encourages it.
Although built on the same technology as last year’s Tag, the concept has been completely redesigned for younger children: they don’t have to be read from start to finish. Instead there are many activities that children unlock through exploration of the illustrations as well as the text. Tag Junior comes with one book. Additional books ($10.99) based on licenses from Curious George and Dora the Explorer and others, cover concepts like colors, counting, and shapes. Keep in mind a substantial hidden cost: the device requires a computer to download the programs to the wand – an activity that should be done by an adult.
Early School Years
One of the big trends this year is using game platforms for learning games. Jumpstart Pet Rescue ($39.99) brings the kind of learning titles that used to be very popular on computers to the much less expensive Wii platform. Letter, color and shape recognition games are mixed in with entertaining music videos (“Heads and Shoulders, Knees and Toes”, for example) and creative activities such as decorating your house and personal avatar. It may be some time before there are enough learning titles to justify purchasing a game platform solely for educational purposes, but if big brother or sister already has a Wii, surely their younger sibling will want to play as well. Jumpstart Pet Rescue helps alleviate parental concerns about video games turning their children into game playing zombies by mixing fun with learning.
MY Virtual Tutor ($29.99) is another example of this trend. It brings reading readiness to the Nintendo DS, so kids can practice reading skills interactively wherever they go. There are three different packages (Pre-K to Kindergarten, Kindergarten to First Grade, and First Grade to Second Grade) each developing curriculum based skills through practice games and interactive books. Students hold the DS vertically like a book, interacting with the game through the touchpad on the right and viewing the interactive books on the left (each title has 8 books). Developed as part of a university study at the University of Colorado, the program gives kids an opportunity to reinforce school skills.
Even the Xbox360, one of the “go to” consoles for action oriented teen gamers, is being repurposed for education. With Kodu Game Lab ($5 on-line at XboxArcade via the Xbox360) tweens think they are creating video games, but they are actually learning all of the basics of programming! The game harnesses all of the visual power of the Xbox, but stealthily provides deep thinking skills and an introduction to programming. The same program, is now being used by schools across the country on the pc, but it is only available for home use at present on the Xbox360. The game is available only online through the Xbox LIVE Marketplace .
On the Sony PS3 check out Little Big Planet, one of my picks for best product of 2008 demoed on the Today Show last year. Although less "officially" a learning product, it is also a program that lets users create their own games using a visual programming approach. Later this year it will be coming out in a new version designed for the PSP.
PC’s are still an important way kids get educational content. Dreambox.com (Free 2 week trial, $12.95 per month thereafter) is an ambitious on-line subscription service that provides diverse activities that build math skills and provide important feedback to parents and educators. Hundreds of different styles of games and activities keep kids attention as they learn. More than just “multiple choice” and “right” and “wrong” in its approach, this online world of pirates and dinosaurs helps kids learn how to reason their way to the correct answer through the use of on-screen “manipulatives” that help kids visualize the way math interacts with the real world. Parents looking for a free online educational site should also look at the brilliant Professor Garfield site (Professorgarfield.org) which we’ve featured on the Today Show in the past.
Later Elementary School and Beyond
Netbooks are a big part of the back-to-school story for tweens and teens. Models that come with Vista may qualify for the upgrade program to Windows 7 later this year. Disney’s Netpal ($349) is a netbook that comes bundled with special creativity software, a built in webcam and software to keep the kids safer on the net and is designed for tweens. In one computer, two children households, this second machine might be an economical way of avoiding wars over who gets to use the bigger family computer (which might also be storing all the family’s financial info, as well), while keeping younger computer users from accessing parts of the web that are not appropriate.
High school students will be drawn to stylish netbooks like HP’s Mini 110(from $329, $349 for "pink" version). On the plus side netbooks are about half the size and up to half the price of a full laptop. On the downside, they have less powerful processors, and less memory and storage than their big siblings. Their smaller keyboards may work as an advantage to children-sized hands, but can be uncomfortable for full sized teens. They are appropriate for web surfing and word processing, but if your child wants to game or edit videos look to a full size notebook as a better investment. Frugal parents should also consider manufacturer refurbished models – you’ll find them at Ebay and at some manufacturers’ online stores.
Both Amazon’s Kindle (from $299) and Sony’s Pocket Reader (from $200) are ebook readers. Both feature access to huge selections of books that can be purchased and downloaded to the devices. Both promise textbooks, but for the most part the flood of electronic school books is still a thing of the future. I find the Kindle easier to read, but the Sony models have access to a huge free library of free books downloadable from Google and are less expensive. A more expensive Sony Reader ($399, announced this week, available for the holidays) has a 7 inch touch screen, but Sony’s technology relies on downloading via the computer. Amazon’s Kindle can download books without a computer – it’s just like shopping on Amazon with their wireless devices.
This is still new, expensive technology and not essential for most kids this year– there is even a competing format war like the one that accompanied the BlueRay/HD disks last year).
The exception would be if a parent feels that the “newness” of the technology will get an otherwise reluctant reader to give books a try. In that case these devices (which will, no doubt, be cheaper and ubiquitous in the future) can serve as important gateways for teens to a love of reading. They can make reading cool again.
An Ounce of Prevention
Kids bring home viruses from school and friends. Some make them sick, others can wipe out your computer. You must have a complete backup of your computer- not just your documents. Something you can use to get a virus-downed computer back in action in hours, not days. Seagate’s Replica ($89 and up) is a complete and idiot proof solution. You plug it into your computer and it automatically backs up everything. (You might also want a separate off-line backup of your documents using a standard external backup as an archive, but having an image of the disk programs and all has saved me and my kids countless headaches over the years. Replica makes it cheap and simple to be prepared for the inevitable day when your child says “the computer ate my homework”.)
