How To Find The Best Rated Apps For Kids

In preparation for marketing The Prisoner of Carrot Castle, I did some research to find app reviewers and discovered some great sites I want to pass on to busy mom's. If you're an iPad, iPhone or iPad Touch user looking for great apps to make your busy mom's life a bit easier, read on.

First up, Apps for Children With Special Needs:

a4cwsn is committed to helping the families of children with special needs and the community of educators and therapists who support them. By producing videos that demonstrate how products educate children, a4cwsn provides a way for users to see how an app works before they buy—great concept. Choose apps to review by various categories (e.g., colors, creative play, etc.), iTunes category or developer. There are apps for motor skill development, autistic kids and if you're a special needs family, they currently have a campaign to give away iPads. Check it out.

Digital Story Time creates Top 10 reviews of kid's apps in various categories (e.g., most educational, most original, best extras, etc.). You can also find ideas, such as how to have a successful digital bedtime experience with your kids.

Digital Story Time (blog titled The Digital Media Diet) is one mom's take on kids, technology and the world of apps. This site also provides a rich resource of links to other sites for parents.

Appcheese is a straight forward review site for kids' apps. Each app reviewed receives a cheese wedge rating and lists Platform, Price, Age Group and Publisher.

Pictured with each review is the app's icon for the iTunes store along with screen shots and the book trailer (if available). An iTunes button below the icon allows you to order the app. Scan the sidebar to see a list of recently reviewed apps. Lots to love about this clean review site.

Apps for Kids~kids learning (disguised as fun) is a review site by a mom in Silicon Valley. Primarily doing reviews, she dispenses some wisdom on how to balance your kid's time on technology. Providing parents a short cut to finding some real gems, is her intent, plus giving an honest opinion on a few of the popular apps that may be stinkers. Apps for Kids is focussed on making it easy for parents to find an app for a particular purpose. By the way, contributors to the site include Dad and 5-year-old son Sal.

The Greasy Screen (don't you love the title?) discusses ebooks for kids, reading habits and stuff. Crystal, from the Chicago suburbs, blogs here and covers all things picture books—right up my alley.

Besides ebooks, you'll find library books reviewed. Each app review shows a screen shot with app title, publisher, format (iPad, iPhone), number system rating, synopsis, current price, features (e.g., interactivity, sound effects) and a brief written review.

Last, but not least The iPhone Mom reviews all things for kids and parenting for the iPhone and iPad. She will hunt down little known apps hidden in the deep recesses of the iTunes store (and they are deep).

Reviews are categorized for moms, toddlers, pre-schoolers, elementary school and beyond, plus a category just for iPad. Every week a special is posted that might be an interview with a developer, navigating in the App Store/iTunes or a step by step "how to," for example, submit an app review.

I hope this gives you lots of places to find great apps for your family fun and learning.

Why I Write for Children

I am passionate about writing for children. They are our future. It is our job to nurture them to become independent, caring and productive adults. Writing books for children is one way I can have an impact on the growth and character of children.

Those of you who follow my blog will remember my grand-nephew Drew. I featured Drew in my post Precious Moments of Independence. His mom recently bought him "The Giving Tree" by Shel Silverstein. After a few readings by mom and dad, Drew could read for himself... with a smidge of help. Drew is a very bright four-year-old despite his autism. A diagnosis of autism does not preclude a child from learning. Check out his "reading" skills on the video.

Reading to children is the best way to get your child to be a good reader. It opens up new worlds and experiences for their growing minds to soak up.

Precious Moments of Independence

On the Fourth of July we celebrate the July 4th, 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence. It marked our separation from England following a period of struggle with the British monarchy of King George III.

We celebrated the 4^th of July with a BBQ and a viewing of fireworks in our suburban community of El Dorado Hills (population 35,000). This was the first fireworks event for El Dorado Hills and it turned out to be spectacular. Emergency agencies estimated attendance to be 20,000!

After a short walk from where we parked, we settled into the perfect viewing spot on a hill overlooking the fireworks staging area. The entourage from our BBQ included my brother Mark and his extended family—Scott and Sara with their kids, Drew and Bean.

Four-year-old Drew has autism, a developmental disability that strikes 1 in 110 children and 1 in 70 boys. Drew had no trouble cozying up to a grandmotherly woman sitting next to him on the hill. A complete stranger.

“Hi,” Drew said wiggling onto her padded seat on the ground.

"Well... Hi there," she politely replied.

Drew chattered on about the fireworks and very quickly a bond was made. She produced Drew's favorite "toy," an iPhone, and trustingly handed it to him. I watched in amazement as this sweet stranger interacted with Drew.

"I don't have very many games," she said while Drew deftly searched her apps.

When the lights shut off, Drew got excited. "Ready?" he shouted. "Are you ready?"

As the fireworks filled the air in front of us, the woman asked, "Which one is your favorite?"

Drew waited and watched. Several splashes of color later he shouted, "That's my favorite! ... and that's my favorite!"

At one point in the precious display of independence, I heard the woman say in response to Drew, "I don't have any children so I don't have any grandchildren."

It touched my heart to know how special this interchange must have been. How a fearless, autistic child feels no boundaries about approaching a perfect stranger to make a friend. That evening as Drew jumped up and down yelling "Bye" to his new friend, I couldn't help think the gentlewoman left richer because of a child's moment of independence.