Dear Glenn,

We did a study about the use of technology for early literacy: 1. a review of the literature; 2.a delphi study among researchers and practitioners and 3.a follow up study among teacher educators. All three studies are currently under review. But if you send me an email I can send you the preliminary versions of the papers.

Kind regards, Joke

Dear Joke,

Thanks for your response and it was so good to see you at our TPACK Symposium in Las Vegas in March. My email is [email protected]. This would be great.

Dr Michelle Neumann is currently undertaking post-doctoral research through the Griffith Institute for Educational Research and I'm her assigned mentor. Her research is focusing on emerging digital literacy skills, early childhood and technologies, including iPads. If it's okay with you, Michelle and I will appreciate the preliminary research, and we can share our work with you as well.

Best wishes always, Glenn

Any developmentally appropriate apps.

Please click on the flowing website for more info

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ns0QhjkXjWk

Thanks Fathi. There's some important messages in the video, especially the need for more research in this area; i.e. learning by young children in a multi-touch, digital world and the implications for initial teacher education programs, which do seem to be lagging behind the technological developments.

He makes the case that, while the research is inconclusive, the technologies are already in the lives of very young children. So...there's a need for guidance for teachers, and also for parents and carers. Lots of 'C' words were helpful - Child, context and content and control, and also choice, creativity, cooperation and  collaboration, consequences, co-creating and co-viewing. A critical consideration is access and making a difference for all children, not some.

I like apps that replace physical games that sometimes seem boring but when it's an app it's fun...and you can play them "on the go". See for instance KidsDoodle which also automatically turns your doodle into a movie...

Apps are endless for this age group and cover a very diverse range of topics and skills - here are four that I like a lot in the domain of math...  Hope it helps!

Geo Board – This application explores the world of shapes and the possibilities which are presented when given a peg board and a rubber band.  We have had fun creating our names, as well as various shape patterns. This application is aimed for those with some experience in using a tablet device (Little F, age 3, found it hard to use). It does not allow you to save your creations, however a quick screen grab by holding down the power button in the top right hand corner and the home key (on an iPad) will save an image to your camera roll.

Counting to 10 – Based around the concept of one to one correspondence, this app teaches using little penguins, moles, elephants, manta rays.   It involves a lot of repetition with both visual counting aids, as well as a little narrator counting aloud for you as you go (available for Android as well)!

Montessori Numbers – Another app based on the foundations of Montessori created by L’Escapadou. This app is a delightful starting spot for introducing numbers, as well as for those moving into the hundreds. It uses tracing numbers, base ten, number stories, and one to one correspondence to help children learn.  There are a number of difficulty levels going up to 999.

Tam and Tao in Numberland created by Les Trois Elles Interactive – Adorable in every way.  This company create some delightful applications and Numberland is one of them.

Thanks Kimberley. These are great ideas.

Glenn

Have a look at some of Catherine Attard's work. While she has a mathematics focus, her reviews of Apps are   very useful. Search on Catherine Attard for loads of detail or there is a sample link below to some App reviews http://www.materdei.qld.edu.au/downloads/TechiPadAppsAndMathematics.pdf

Jill

Dear Glenn,

Google earth and interactive 3D geography models are excellent apps for geography/social studies, and science classes.

Best regards,

Mohammed

Is it for learning or assessment? You may also want to look at the research work "E4Kids" under Melbourne University.

Some apps:

http://www.early-childhood-education-degrees.com/30-ipad-apps-for-early-childhood-education/

http://appsineducation.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/early-childhood-education-and-ipad.html

http://www.bestappsforkids.com/category/apps-for-education/early-learning-apps/

http://technologyinearlychildhood.com/2013/12/23/21-best-apps-preschool-kindergarten-ipads/

For Teachers:

http://www.earlychildhoodteacher.org/blog/ece-technology-10-trending-tools-for-teachers/

Thanks Nafisa.

Hi Glenn, 

I have done extensive work on mathematics apps for primary school students - many of which are potentially appropriate for children. Overall though the apps do not really develop conceptual knowledge but are more drill and practice.  I have indicated below publications related to this topic. 

Cheers, Kevin

Larkin, K. (2015) “An App! An App! - My Kingdom for an App”: An 18 month quest to determine whether apps support mathematical knowledge building. In T. Lowrie & R. Jorgensen (Eds) Digital games and mathematics learning: Potential, promises and pitfalls. Springer Press

Larkin, K. (2015). The Search for Fidelity in Geometry Apps: An Exercise in Futility? In M. Marshman, V. Geiger & A. Bennison (Eds.) Mathematics Education in the Margins. (Proceedings of the 38th Annual Conference of the Mathematics Education Research Group of Australasia). Sunshine Coast, QLD: MERGA

Larkin, K. (2014). Ipad Apps that promote mathematical knowledge? Yes, they exist! Australian Primary Mathematics Classroom, 19(2), 28-32.

Larkin, K. (2013). Mathematics Education. Is there an App for that? In V. Steinle, L. Ball & C. Bardini (Eds.), Mathematics education: Yesterday, today and tomorrow (Proceedings of the 36th annual conference of the Mathematics Education Research Group of Australasia) (pp. 426-433). Melbourne, VIC: MERGA

Great. Thanks Kevin.

Having started to read through these, I like not only the suggestions about apps for Mathematics, but the scholarly approach underpinning this research. For example, your conclusion that many of the Geometry apps were quite poor in terms of their pedagogical, mathematical, and cognitive fidelity.

Similarly, I'm finding that the apps, by themselves, don't guarantee that they will enhance learning, but require teachers to review apps prior to using them, and then teachers tend to 'repurpose' them to align with their planning and implementation.

It seems we need to take care in moving to any new technologies and quickly adopting any apps - such as schools saying they are now iPad schools - without being informed by the educational rationale informing the strategy, reviewing the apps carefully. See, for example,

McFarlane, C. (2013). iPads and Their Potential to Revolutionize Learning. In J. Herrington, A. Couros & V. Irvine (Eds.), Proceedings of EdMedia: World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 2013 (pp. 1690-1695). Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE).

Good morning, Glenn.

I greatly appreciate the possibilities of Lightbot.

It is worth investigating:  http://lightbot.com/ 

Best regards. 

Dear Glenn, 

One of my graduate student analyzed conversations between young children (4-5 yo) who had to create a story. Some of them did it with some sheets of paper (for drawing) and other with the Puppet pals app (an app which allow to create animated cartoons). The results of her exploratory study was that children who use the app had longer conversations. At the end, the stories created with the app was longer too, but less structured than the ones created with no app. I think this app is interesting, because it stimulate children imagination, allowing them to create with a trial-and-error approach. This is facilitative for some children.

Best regards

Hi Glenn

It really depends what you intend to use the app for. It does not hurt to shop around. A colleague of mine was telling me about the Early Learning Apps Archives - Best Apps For Kids- you could google it. 

Dear Glenn,

for early childhood I would recommend following apps (available on iOS):

- Bitsboard (an app that helps you create learning games - for early childhood very nice and easy with pictures, sound and text if you like)

- SockPuppets (creating dialogues with sock puppets)

- QuickVoice (to record songs you sing with the kids)

- Podcasts (to download podcasts such as Sesame street)

- there are many different Book-Apps such as Frankie Frog which are lovely for all age-levels up till 5th grade or so

Hope this could help you!

Regards, Martin

Dear Glen

After searching for a sound design app for young children, I have designed an app called 'mmcreate' which allows children to record and then change sounds (simple vocal, percussive...) - then finally use the amended sounds in simple compositions. It is designed as a creative music tool.

Best wishes

David

Dear Glenn, 

I thought the following might equally be of interest to you - given that as you pointed out there is a lot of debate about apps potential given contextual variations and student needs, and perhaps it is therefore not about the single app per-say (although tried and tested suggestions are wonderful) but equally the ability of assessing individual apps affordances in catering to respective student group needs:

• Balefire Labs (amongst others an apps and game review platform with an educational approach and specific review criteria) http://www.balefirelabs.com/apps/review-criteria/
• Emerging EdTech post on use of evaluation rubrics: http://www.emergingedtech.com/2012/11/selecting-the-best-apps-for-teaching-and-learning-use-a-rubric/
• Digital Promise (works at the intersection of education leaders, researchers, and learning technology developers): http://www.digitalpromise.org/initiatives/marketplace

Hope these are helpful, also plenty of research on the topic and would be glad to discuss more!

Kind regards,

Karen Triquet

 Hello Glenn,

I thought I would add to the responses that I too have found Kevin's work on learning apps to be extensive and  much informative. I reviewed this work for a chapter I co-authored on selecting of mathematics learning apps. The chapter is in press. Here is presentation I share with teachers based on this chapter.

Have a look at this website:https://literacyapps.literacytrust.org.uk/

As an ICT teacher i recommend ScratchJr for preschoolers to develop computational thinking.