While exploring, I stumbled upon four great kids apps that are completely free to use, don’t bombard the kids with ads and offer plenty of hours of entertainment.
1. PicsArt Kids Drawing Coloring
Drawing is one of the best ways for kids to show their creativity (or just make a colorful mess). PicsArt is a basic drawing app that is perfect for kids between two and five years old. The app has a simple interface that comes with two modes: Drawing and Coloring. In the Drawing mode kids are given plain paper or colorful templates to freely draw on. The drawing tools are very interesting and perfect for kids, including twenty-one different colors, the ability to change background color, use of pencil/crayon/brush, the ability to change color density, funny sounds while drawing and more.
Although the child can easily pick a color of their choice, I really like their random color option that changes the pen color whenever you lift your finger, perfect for colorful drawings every time. In the coloring mode, the kids will be given a sketch to draw on. There are dozens of cartoon sketches to choose from, and more can be downloaded for free. All the drawings can be saved to the phone gallery to view at any time.
2. Dr. Panda Restaurant Asia
Kids and their relationship with food is a battle almost every parent has to deal with, and Dr. Panda Restaurant Asia is a cooking game that will surely help kids bond with food. The game has some amazing graphics and a very interactive interface that lets the user communicate with most of the things seen on the screen. The plot is simple – patrons (cute animals) will come to your restaurant and ask for their choice dish. You need to use the given ingredients and utensils to cook the dish. While cooking, you are given full control of how you want to cook. I personally agree with this, as I have spent more than an hour on this game before giving it to my kid. There was just so much to do that I couldn’t stop. For example, you can choose your own ingredients, select the method of cooking, slice the food in your own way (like the Fruit Ninja game), and add spices of your choice.
Although the control over cooking is great, this doesn’t mean you can cook any way you like and get away with it. The customer will eat that food and give reactions according to how it tasted. The reactions can be very funny and also satisfying for the hard work you did. I also liked the ingredients offered, containing colorful (looking very fresh) vegetables and protein-rich food, good for bonding kids with healthy food.
3. Quizlet
This is a learning app for kids of all ages (even teenagers). Quizlet is a community driven app where you can create and share your own learning material with other users or see what other millions of users are sharing. The app uses flashcards, quizzes and beat-the-time matches to help you learn. You will find information on almost any type of topic. Just search for it, and you will get the results. You can also join classes to gain more knowledge on subjects of your liking everyday.
The app makes it very easy to learn using voice narration (machine-based for eight een languages) and pictures. I have searched for all basic subjects like Math, Science, Languages, etc. and found some great (and accurate) lessons and classes.
4. Kids Place – Parental Control
This isn’t actually an app for entertaining the kids; instead it is a parental control app launcher that helps keep control of kids’ activity on a phone. I found Kids Place to be a good addition in this list as it is perfect to ensure your kids only access apps and data they should be accessing while giving you peace of mind. The app’s features include a custom display with limited apps, time tracking and locking of the phone after a specified time, changing wallpapers, enabling Flight mode, managing multiple profiles (for more than one chile), and plugin support for extra features (like remote access),
I really liked its auto-restart option that restarts an exited app after five seconds if not canceled. This feature is perfect for kids who may accidentally exit apps. While working it can be really annoying to deal with accidental exits. The app is protected by a pin code, and kids can’t exit out of it without it. I have tried removing it from active applications, pressed the Home button, pressed the back button and even took the battery out, but it was all in vain. The app just doesn’t let you access other phone functions without the pin. I am sure kids are going to have a difficult time getting out of it.
Conclusion
There is much more to talk about and discover in these apps, but I am going let you do some exploring as well. I am using all of these apps in conjunction with Kids Place to give my chold a safe space for entertainment and learning right on my Android device. Do check these apps out and let us know in the comments if you liked them. Also, if you have any questions or need some clarification before trying any of these apps, feel free to let us know.
