Having spent the last year under lockdowns and stay-at-home orders, having engaging and educational tools to use at home with kids has become more valuable than ever. Whether you’re going through a lockdown, building your homeschooling repertoire, or just need some fun educational activities to give your child after school, there’s tons of fantastic digital learning tools that your kids will love.
PBSKids (Ages 2-5)
PBS has always been home to some of the best free educational content, and now it’s available online! Home to both videos of beloved PBS Kids shows and interactive games, the PBS Kids website and accompanying app are a great way for kids to have fun while learning valuable early skills in math, reading, and science. The best part is that it’s 100% free!
ABCMouse (Ages 2-7)
A fantastic all-around learning platform for young children, ABCMouse offers lessons in reading, math, science, and art for young children. The lessons have varying levels and grow in difficulty as your child learns, so your child will have plenty of material to keep entertained for a while. The games are fun and simple so little ones shouldn’t need much parental assistance in order to operate the games – a must-have for busy working parents! The program is a paid subscription of $12.99/month, but they offer a free one-month trial for new families. The program can be played on a computer, tablet, or phone, so it goes wherever your family goes!
Khan Academy Kids (Ages 2-8)
Khan Academy is a longstanding pillar of the online educational community, but for years its content has been targeted towards teenagers and adults. With the launch of its children’s platform, now your little ones can get in on the learning, too! Available via the app store on your devices, Khan Academy Kids has lessons and curriculum for literacy and math skills for early learners. It even includes supplemental printable worksheets and parental learning planners! The best part is that the entire experience is 100% free and sans advertisements.
Montessori Preschool (Ages 2-10)
With dozens of activities and apps to choose from, Montessori Preschool has an activity for every subject and learning area. Earlier games are well set up for young children who don’t yet know how to read and are easy to understand. The games for young children teach simple skills like understanding numbers, shapes, colors, and letters, while the more advanced games teach skills like geometry, spelling, addition, and subtraction. Pricing depends on the game selected, but most are between $3-5.
ReadingIQ (Ages 2-12)
ReadingIQ is an entire digital library of books for children, starting with picture books and including popular chapter books. It’s a great way to satisfy the voracious reader in your life, as it includes an unlimited number of books in their library! The platform includes built-in reading assessments and comes with books from hugely popular publishers, with Star Wars and Marvel books included. A monthly subscription is $7.99/month or you can purchase an annual membership for $39.99/year if you’d like to save some money.
TurtleDiary (Ages 4-9)
Turtle Diary is a collection of games, printable activities, and educational quizzes for kids ranging from Pre-K up through 5th grade. Covering topics such as shapes, spelling, grammar, money, and math, there’s an activity to supplement whatever they’re learning about. They even have a broad library of educational videos and assessment quizzes so parents can easily assess their child’s skills at home without worry. The entire game, video, and quiz library is free to use for all!
SplashLearn (Ages 4-10)
With both web applications and apps available for phones and tablets, SplashLearn is full of learning activities in math and reading for Pre-K and elementary kids. Available for both classrooms and families, kids adore getting a chance to play SplashLearn and learn a full curriculum of mathematical and literary skills. The platform is completely free to sign up for and is uniquely tailored to the strengths and weaknesses of your child’s learning!
Scholastic Learn at Home (Ages 4-10)
Scholastic Learn at Home is an incredible library of at-home lessons for children ranging from Pre-K through 5th grade. With a variety of simple, short videos and full lessons, topics range from dinosaurs to space to the human body. Focusing largely on science and special interest topics, kids will have absolutely no problem finding something interesting to watch. There’s even Reading Quests where kids can take on special challenges to research and analyze new subjects. The whole platform is completely free to use for families, so get on it!
TicToc Time (Ages 5-8)
Reading analog clocks can be a challenge for young learners. It’s often deeply counterintuitive for many young learners, and in recent years schools have been removing it from their standardized curriculum. Fortunately, TicToc Time is here to help them through it! Through simple, fun, graphic activities and interactive games, TicToc Time helps kids learn how to read a clock face. The app is available for $5.49 on Android and Apple devices.
Grammaropolis (Ages 5-10)
No kid is excited to learn about grammar. That is, unless they’re learning with Grammaropolis! This site gamifies grammar learning to make it fun and engaging to learn about language, spelling, and grammar. Kids get to watch fun videos, play games, and read books to learn about grammar, all while exploring the exciting cartoon world of Grammaropolis! Parents can even track their child’s progress through the activities and see their results in real time. A limited section of the site is available for free, or you can upgrade to the premium membership for full access for $29.99 per year, which allows you to create up to 10 student accounts.
BrainPOP (Ages 5-12)
BrainPOP is a fun, engaging series of videos and lessons on every subject imaginable, from core subjects like reading, math, and science to exciting extracurricular subjects like art history and engineering. There’s even resources for social emotional learning and coding skills! Kids love the fun, quirky videos and the platform includes a full curriculum. Family plan subscriptions are $14,95 per month, or can be bundled for an annual discount at $95.20 per year.
National Geographic Kids (Ages 5-12)
National Geographic has managed to compile an immense amount of educational resources into a single platform with National Geographic Kids. Full of videos, games, and interactive activities, the site covers a huge diversity of topics. Learning about geography, animals, space, and reading is all just a click away on National Geographic Kids. It’s also a completely free resource, so you can let your child spend hours watching their fun, engaging educational videos without having to worry about the cost one bit!
The Old Farmer’s Almanac for Kids (Ages 6-12)
This is a great resource for kids to check in with daily to always find something new to learn! The site updates daily with new things to learn about the current phase of the moon, historical events that took place on the day’s date, the current weather, fun new facts to learn about animals and science, and even riddles and puzzles to play along with! The website is completely free to use and doesn’t even require you to sign up or log in to use it. Set it as your child’s web browser home page so they always open their internet browser to new things to learn!
MetKids (Ages 7-12)
If your little learner is craving a visit to the museum, look no further! The Metropolitan Museum of art has compiled tons of learning resources for kids to explore right from the comfort of their own homes. With tools like an interactive museum map to explore, behind-the-scenes videos of the artifacts in the museum, and tons of creative projects to try, it’s just as fun as an in-person trip. There’s even a “time machine” where kids can explore through the past and learn incredible things about history and art. The entire site is also completely free to use, courtesy of the Met!
Prodigy (Ages 7-14)
If your student is struggling with math, Prodigy could be just the thing to help. Prodigy gamifies mathematical learning and tailors the experience of playing based on the mathematical assessment of your child’s skills. Kids will be excited to reach milestones as they earn special in-game rewards, like their own Prodigy pet and custom character building. You can even create a parent account where you can see your child’s progress over time and look at the data of their mathematical skills. The game itself is free to play, or unlock special extra features and activities with a premium membership for $4.99 per month.
MissionUS (Ages 8-13)
MissionUS is a series of “serious games” about “serious history,” with compelling and historically accurate educational games about various times in US history. Six different games feature six different storylines from across the history of the United States, starting with the Revolutionary War and including slavery, westward expansion, the industrial revolution, the Great Depression, and World War II. The games do need to be downloaded onto a computer in order to play, and some of the games may feature difficult content, so parents are warned to check beforehand and ensure that the game is appropriate for their child. All of the games are free and available for both Mac and PC computers.
Adventure Academy (Ages 8-12)
Adventure Academy, made by the same creators as ABCMouse, is a game that’s sure to grab your little one’s attention. While the format and experience of Adventure Academy is much like playing an RPG video game, it’s chock full of educational content for the elementary school student in your life. Covering math, science, reading, and social studies, kids have a chance to learn their core subjects while feeling like they’re playing an exciting video game that takes place at a school for fantastical adventurers! Available on computer, tablet, or phone, the monthly subscription is $12.99 per month after a one-month trial.
DOGO News (Ages 8-14)
For kids who are interested in current events but aren’t quite mature enough for adult news, there’s DOGO News. DOGO News updates with new articles on current events and fun science topics in a way that challenges young readers without overwhelming them with adult topics. The site covers science topics such as environmentalism and animals, as well as civic, global news, and social studies. The site is even available in both english and spanish for multilingual learners with a fascination for news and current events. It’s completely free to access and has a huge archive of fantastic articles to read!
CodaKid (Ages 7+)
If you have an avid video gamer kid, they’re going to love CodaKid. CodaKid is a way to learn coding skills through playing video games, learning coding languages like Python, Scratch, JavaScript, and HTML by playing games they’re already familiar with like Minecraft and Roblox. For computer newbies, there’s even courses available for typing skills and computer usage basics. Available through self-paced online courses or one-on-one tutoring sessions, your kid will be coding his own video games in no time! Monthly subscriptions are available for $25 or you can get 50% off by purchasing the annual membership.
Smithsonian Learning Lab (Ages 8+)
The Smithsonian Learning Lab is a collection of lessons, videos, and research made available to the public for free. Whether your child needs help researching something for a school project or is simply curious to know more about the night sky or art history, there’s plenty to find on the Learning Lab. Massive numbers of research collections have been digitized to explore, as well as a number of interactive lessons and learning games.