iPad

Last week, I splurged and bought a refurbished first generation iPad. With the release of the iPad 2, Apple cut the price on the original iPad. Since we purchased a refurbished model (which comes with the same warranty as a new iPad), I saved an additional $50. It's going to be such a great resource for us. I've already found so many fun, educational apps for the kids.

This morning,Thing 4 sat in front of the map and played  Stack The States, even though it's Spring Break and we have taken a week off from "school". (I realize it looks like she's looking at the map of the world, but she's really looking at the map of the U.S. which is hanging above the world map. The world map will come in handy when she plays Stack The Countries.)

Stack the States is such a fun way to learn about state geography, capitals, shape, where they fit on the map, etc. Here's a short video that shows the app in action.




 Another great app that we have found is BrainPop. BrainPop has short, animated movies on many different topics across all subject areas. Every day there is a new BrainPop movie. Each morning we check for the new movie. In addition to the daily featured movie, you can search their large database of other movies for others your kiddos might find interesting.

Here is an example of a featured movie:

 
 
If you don't have an iPad, you can get a membership at the BrainPop website. There seems to be a lot of information and many educational tools there.

There are so many more fabulous apps for education that I haven't had the chance to check out yet. We also plan to use the iPad for writing papers and playing with videos, photos and music. 

iPad, where have you been my whole life?