As a firm supporter of learn through play techniques I am always on the lookout for new ideas and tools to make learning fun for young children. I believe in good foundations and a fun approach to education from a very young age is invaluable to help kids through school later on. The amount of games out there is really inspirational; besides a large range of traditional activities today we have a whole new world available to us in a click. You just need to visit the App store to see how many good quality educational apps are available; some are free others you pay a small amount to download. Recently I was compiling a group of activities for kids centered around the popular Wheels On The Bus song so I went looking for an iPhone app of the song, that’s how I have come across Duck Duck Moose who developed the award winning educational children’s applications for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad including Wheels On The Bus and Baa, Baa Black Sheep. The Wheel On The Bus is a great app, you can sing along and touch the wheels to make them go round, open and shut the doors and move the wipers amongst other things, but the most fun part is the multi language aspect. In addition to English you are able to select Spanish, Italian, French and German. My son loves the German and Spanish versions so much he listens to them over and over again and although the German words are difficult to single out he has almost learnt the whole Spanish version. You can even record yourself singing and select the instrumental music you prefer. This app is truly entertaining.

The new Fish School app by the same developers is great. The very popular ABC song with classical music arrangements, a memory game and spot the difference are some of the features that make this application a really fun learning tool for young children. Add to that the colourful fish swimming on the screen forming letters, numbers and shapes and you can be sure your little ones will be entertained whilst being educationally stimulated.