Tablet for preschoolers

[Deleted]

My almost 5 year old still really likes his LeapPad2 and has had it for 2-3 years. He's always taking pictures with it and distorting them.   But the downloads/cartridges are expensive, so he only has a few educational apps that grandparents have bought and you can't play movies on it, but I have a DVD player in the van so don't care.   I don't know. I guess if I had the money, I'd go for the ipad, but the one thing that would worry me is how much abuse it can take.  My son is pretty careful, but he's still dropped the LeapPad a lot and once down a flight of stairs.  That thing is bombproof I think.

[Deleted]

My grandkids have been on ipads since ages 2/4/6 (now 6/8/10). There are so many free learning apps, story reading apps, programming apps (yup, designed for their age to learn programming language) that they have zero interest in the more limited cartridge based games.  They also love that they can google stuff if they need/want to look it up. Learning how to build effective search criteria is good for them and it helps their desire to know how to spell correctly.

I feel like the ipad is more of a learning tool because they are technology that is pertinent in their life. And ummm, yeah, if I have a question on my iPhone functions, they can usually answer it for me . . . might be a little embarrassing, but I like that they are 'tech-smarter' than me. I think they also enjoy teaching grandma things now & then!

The only thing I worry about is that the ipads (we had full size ones) are hard to keep safe from breakage when in the younger one's hands. At 6+ years old they seem to have the understanding and motor skills not to be dropping them or leaving them on the floor to be stepped on. The protection plans available when I bought the first iPad was only for a year, so that was nice, but I would have preferred to insure breakage a little longer :-) I don't know if there are Otter cases for the mini's, but I would want something like that on them for younger kids.

They are also great in the car because you can download movies and just run them. They can also play a lot of the apps without being 'on-line'. It keeps them very occupied during our long drives (I use iPods in the car because the iPads stay at their house).

Just make sure you get a good amount of memory to support all the stuff you will want to download. Also be aware that as the iOs gets upgraded, there is a point where your pad/pod won't support further upgrades, so you are stuck with what you have & then can't download new apps that use the newer iOs. So, they have designed in their obsolescence . . . which is a PITA since the kids are attached to the i-thingies. I think we had 3-4 years of use on them before that occurred & then you can use them like another year, but the kids get frustrated that they can't download new apps they heard about. 

[Lizard Queen]

We got our DS a cheap Dragon Touch tablet with a bumper around it for his 5th birthday.  It works fine, and I freak out much less about the prospect of his breaking it than an iPad.  

[giramomma]

We got DD1 a Kindle Fire when she turned 5. She's treated very well. I spent about $125 during Christmas.

[MarleyKeezy78]

DS got his first iPad around age 2, he has a military grade case and the only thing that ever happed (when he was about four) was he cracked the screen, we upgraded and haven't had an issue (knock on wood) since. He is pretty carful with it, but it has seen some rough stuff. Great apps and easy to use. Wouldn't ever get something else  

[Ryan]

Those leappads are garbage and I hate everything that leapfrog sells. What you save upfront would be spent on other games and my kids never really got into the whole thing.  

I would just buy 2 full size ipads.  I know you can buy the ipad air (prior model) at Costco for maybe $400 and you can get a $40 itunes gift card with it.  We just buy all of our movies on itunes now and have an apple TV as well.  So you can download movies, stream them on AppleTV, and then download them right to the ipad for car rides.  Plus the apps are just way way better on an ipad.

Our first ipad we bought was an ipad 2 about 4 years ago and it still works great.  In the long-run, the ipad is a much, much better investment.

I wouldn't worry about them damaging them either.  As long as you have a cheap case from amazon, it'll protect it well enough.

[whoisjohngalt]

Wow, thank G-d my kids don't read this board.

I am nowhere near OK getting them ipads

[Deleted]

My kids were older by the time iPads came around, but I've had younger friends/cousins use them to good success. 

The kids haven minis. They like them. Lighter, more portable (ie fit in a smaller bag). But I like my full size because of the larger screen. Mines a little heavy sometimes, but it's a 2, not sure if the Airs are lighter? 

Mine has a cracked screen. I put a piece of tape over the smushed corner, but deal with the two cracks.. Eventually it will go though. 

Buy good cases. 

[JustLurkin]

Whichever device you choose, get both a screen protector and a case.  I had a case for my son and the screen cracked pretty quickly (he's hard on devices), after getting the screen replaced I got this protector (wish I had heard of it beforehand):

www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KL7O8HS?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00

Now he's had his device several months with no problem.

[quince]

Our son has a Samsung Android tablet. (We went from "Why would we buy our small child electronics?" to "Holy crap toddler on a plane, electronic babysitter please!")

[yogiii]

Jun 7, 2015 22:05:31 GMT -5 whoisjohngalt said:

Wow, thank G-d my kids don't read this board.

I am nowhere near OK getting them ipads

Mine don't have them either.  DS uses an old fashion mouse and keyboard sometimes.

[Wisconsin Beth]

WE got Kindle Jrs. for both kids for Christmas.  Thekids are 5.5 and 7 now.  They love them.  It's preloaded with a crapton of stuff and you can create a profile for them and download stuff from a regular Kindle account.

Pros: the preload has a lot of great stuff, in our opinion.  It's also preset with boundaries.  They come with heavy duty cases - ours get dropped on a reg. basis and they're not cracked or anything.  They have a 2 year warranty that I think is for pretty much anything.

Cons: Our son is constantly running out of space. The boundaries are annoying on 1 game (Township) and some of the purchased additional levels (Where's My Perry) will NOT download on their Kindle JRs.  We had to return our son's on the warrenty less than 3 months after purchase as it wouldn't turn on.  Amazon was great with that, I won't say no hassle but it was one of the easiest returns I've ever had to do, online OR in person.  Batteries drain when brightness is at 100% but are fine (again, in my opinion) at less than 40% brightness.  Most of the time we're indoors so dimmer isn't an issue.  Some of the preloaded stuff sucks and some of it is a memory pig. 

[MJ2.0]

DS had a Samsung Galaxy tablet that I won at a work contest (X and I already had our own tablets). When that mysteriously died - still don't know what happened there - he inherited my Google Nexus 7 and I got a Samsung Galaxy for Christmas. I put lots of free preschool games on there and he really likes playing with it. He'll be 4 at the end of July.

[Angel!]

Jun 7, 2015 13:36:46 GMT -5 giramomma said:

We got DD1 a Kindle Fire when she turned 5. She's treated very well. I spent about $125 during Christmas.

  My kids have had a kindle fire for ~18 months now.  You can buy a super heavy-duty kid case for them.  That thing has been dropped or thrown dozens of times & works fine. 

They finally have made it capable of having several users & parental controls.  So you can put in time of day limits, game time limits, and put in which apps, etc they will have access to.  They also have a subscription which we had for a while that provided all sorts of books & games, including books that would read aloud to you. 

What has turned out really nice is that DS1 has some programs through school that have apps on the kindle.  So he can do math homework & reading on the kindle instead of having to sit at the computer.

[HoneyBBQ]

We have some old HP touchpads (on clearance for $99!) and we download shows/ games/ movies on it for DD for long car trips and plane rides. She puts her headphones on and she's good for at least an hour or two, which can help if she's fussy, we need to have adult conversation, a nap, etc.

So, yeah. I'm a fan. We flew SEA - ORD through LAX this spring and that was a LONG ass day. I'm glad she had her own entertainment. On planes we also like it if they have the personalized TV because they always have SOME free cartoon to watch. 

[MJ2.0]

there are other good tablets out there - don't get sucked into drinking the Apple Kool-Aid.

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

Batteries drain when brightness is at 100% but are fine (again, in my opinion) at less than 40% brightness. Most of the time we're indoors so dimmer isn't an issue. Some of the preloaded stuff sucks and some of it is a memory pig.


If you keep the Kindle in airplane mode except when you are downloading, it helps a LOT on the battery longevity.

[MJ2.0]

Jun 8, 2015 11:39:09 GMT -5 alwaysbeoptimizing said:

Jun 8, 2015 10:53:53 GMT -5 MJ2.0 said:

there are other good tablets out there - don't get sucked into drinking the Apple Kool-Aid.

yes, but ulterior motive is that daddy wants to become a pilot, and i'll basically need an ipad for that.

Really?  That's cool!

[Ryan]

Jun 8, 2015 10:51:01 GMT -5 alwaysbeoptimizing said:

OK, so i fixed the frogs we had (the rechargeable batteries in them were ruined after not being used for 18 months.

synced with my pc, set up the parent accounts, downloaded updates and bought them a few games (70 on one and 50 on another so they'd have different games). We'll see what they do with them.

I think, starting from zero, i'd buy the ipads, but i hate apple with a white hot fire, so not sure.

Why do you hate apple?  There are some little things that I think are annoying, but I just find their products work better.  I'm not totally sold on converting over fully and buying a PC, but for purchasing content (movies, music, podcast) and playing it (ipad, iphone, appleTV), they are way better than their competitors.

[Deleted]

Jun 8, 2015 10:51:01 GMT -5 alwaysbeoptimizing said:

but i hate apple with a white hot fire, so not sure.

Why? Because they knew what we "needed" before we even dreamed it 

[Wisconsin Beth]

Jun 8, 2015 12:00:48 GMT -5 The Walk of the Penguin Mich said:

Batteries drain when brightness is at 100% but are fine (again, in my opinion) at less than 40% brightness. Most of the time we're indoors so dimmer isn't an issue. Some of the preloaded stuff sucks and some of it is a memory pig.


If you keep the Kindle in airplane mode except when you are downloading, it helps a LOT on the battery longevity.

Good to know.  Thanks!

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

Jun 8, 2015 13:25:03 GMT -5 Wisconsin Beth said:

Jun 8, 2015 12:00:48 GMT -5 The Walk of the Penguin Mich said:

Batteries drain when brightness is at 100% but are fine (again, in my opinion) at less than 40% brightness. Most of the time we're indoors so dimmer isn't an issue. Some of the preloaded stuff sucks and some of it is a memory pig.


If you keep the Kindle in airplane mode except when you are downloading, it helps a LOT on the battery longevity.

Good to know.  Thanks!

I found this out when my Paperwhite didn't have near the battery longevity that it claimed to.  I did a little digging around and found that looking for a connection/remaining connected eats up battery life.  So my Paperwhite went from about 1 week between charges to about 6 weeks.

[Deleted]

Jun 8, 2015 13:34:49 GMT -5 alwaysbeoptimizing said:

Jun 8, 2015 13:22:51 GMT -5 @rockit said:

Why? Because they knew what we "needed" before we even dreamed it 

actually no. Every experience I've had with an apple product has been it infuriates me constantly by guessing what i'm trying to do.  how about the OS "step off" and let me do what i'm trying to do instead of guessing.  Also, how about some standardized app controls and the ability to get to app settings from the app in a standard way.

oooh, and how about NOT requiring me to install software on my pc to use your device (recently remedied in iTunes to not require it on a pc to set up a tablet)

the ONLY thing (for me) they have going for them is the app catalog.  the hardware/price/performance is inferior to both Windows and Android based offerings in many cases.

my only hope is i won't need to wear skinny jeans and talk about Cuban sandwhiches all day (hipsters)

I was an original PC fan, but adapted quickly to i-stuff.  I found that you need less memory on the i-pad than Surface because the OS takes up less room. Maybe they are more cost equal now, but the windows based tablets appeared less powered or functional to me in the beginning. I have no experience with Chrome-books or Android tablets, but would be interested in hearing about those.

Oh, and because of this thread (I think it was Ryan's comment) I ordered a new Air-2 yesterday from Costco. It was a nice discount and still seems to get the extended warranty from Costco (w00t). Not as cheap as he mentioned, but I went for more gigs. This will be for the kids, but I need to get one more computer for them & need to check with DD what they want - PC vs mini or whatever. 

alwaysbeoptimizing - If you can tell me where to get a REAL Cuban sandwich on the eastside, I will be forever in your debt!!!! The two things I miss most from NYC are the pizza & Cubans . . . sigh . . . okay, maybe the museums and culture too, but that I can live without.

I was making cheater Cubans on my pannini press, but I have not found the right crusty rolls to make them really authentic yet!!

[kcladyjane]

I want to jump on here and ask a couple of questions about tablets. If I download videos...do I have to have an internet connection to play them on a tablet or phone? I need to download Mickey Mouse Club cartoons to play in the car where I probably won't have strong internet signals. What are my best options?  I assume all apps need internet.  So what program should I use to not need a signal to play the videos?

[Lizard Queen]

My kid plays his app games all the time in the car, and we don't have a mobile hotspot or anything.  I know at least Angry Birds works sans internet connection. 



(I would think anything you download would work, as long as you don't have to enter an extra passcode or something when you want to watch.)