Kids tablets discussion

[Danno]

Seems like there are tons of parents on here interested in the same things, so I made a generic title, but I have a specific question:

Anyone have the Kindle Fire Kids Edition? Amazon Prime is having a one day sale, and I'm thinking of getting it for my 5 1/2 year old who starts kindergarten next month. Thoughts, experiences?

[sfotex]

I bought a couple for our kids for this last Christmas. They love them, the parental management seems to work well, you can set daily usage limits, etc.

[digitaldeath]

you want your kid to be a consumer zombie?

[Danno]

you want your kid to be a consumer zombie?

yes, yes I do. Until she decides to eat my brains.

[BmillsSkier]

Damnit, I was really hoping this would b a thread to make Hugh proud. I was all set to brag about how we have a no screen time policy until after age 2 and very limited after that; and the above-average TGR parenting discussion that would follow.


Since you got all specific and shit though I'll say that my sisters two girls (7,4) have the Kindle Fire Kids and everyone loves it. They aren't fucking navel-gazing zombies like my in-laws kids from dawn to dusk with their iPads. Go for it.

[sfotex]

you want your kid to be a consumer zombie?

I'm hoping they become investment bankers or dentists, but I could settle for consumer zombie.

[TAFKALVS]

you want your kid to be a consumer zombie?

I would have watched so much porn with a tablet and high speed internet as a pre-/early teen. Family computer in the living room with with slow-ass dial-up and filters was a lot of work to jerk ratio, but even then I found a way. Are you sure this is a good idea?

[mcsquared]

My 5yo has a Kindle fire. Biggest downside is battery life kind of sucks compared to more expensive tablets and you are locked into the Amazon app store. Some of the cool games aren't available there. Mostly use it for Netflix and it works fine for the money.

[hutash]

I am a bit of a luddite. I am an absolute believer in getting you kids to read. What ever it takes. We live in a house of books, mostly printed. We read to our kids, our kids saw us reading, it was emphasized how important it was from they start. My kids are avid readers, and excelled in school because of it. I don't know if a Kindle is the way to do that, I doubt it. Having hard bound books that you can look through as a family seems to me the way to go. Now that my kids are grown, e books are fine, but when they were young, nothing was better then reading, and they inturn, reading Green Eggs and Ham.

I don't have grand kids yet, but I can tell you when we do, they will get hard bound books read to them when they are with us.

Both my wife and I have Nooks, but we have a shit ton of books all over our house.

See the Star Trek episode on "Atoz"

[Cruiser]

All 3 of my boys have kindles. They love them. We regulate the apps they can download and we regulate the amount of time they can spend on them (all screen time actually). Tablets are great little toys for kids if used in moderation and with supervision. Just be sure to get one of those thickly padded cases and be careful letting your progeny plug and unplug it since the damned micro usb's aren't very durable.

[Harry]

GET OFF MY LAWN !

FIFY.

[Sirshredalot]

I am a bit of a luddite. I am an absolute believer in getting you kids to read. What ever it takes. We live in a house of books, mostly printed. We read to our kids, our kids saw us reading, it was emphasized how important it was from they start. My kids are avid readers, and excelled in school because of it. I don't know if a Kindle is the way to do that, I doubt it. Having hard bound books that you can look through as a family seems to me the way to go. Now that my kids are grown, e books are fine, but when they were young, nothing was better then reading, and they inturn, reading Green Eggs and Ham.

I don't have grand kids yet, but I can tell you when we do, they will get hard bound books read to them when they are with us.

Both my wife and I have Nooks, but we have a shit ton of books all over our house.

See the Star Trek episode on "Atoz"

Where can I read a Star Trek episode?

[BmillsSkier]

Where can I read a Star Trek episode?

In the Historical Documents.

[hutash]

Seriously? Just about every sci-fi episode of every show and movie is available in book form.

I had a client who was an elementary school teacher once tell me, "I don't care what kids read, as long as they are reading." That was before e-books, but I assume she would say that she didn't care how kids read, as long as they were reading, these days.

Yeah, I know I am dating myself, but damn it , these kids are always on my lawn..

[Sirshredalot]

Seriously? Just about every sci-fi episode of every show and movie is available in book form.

I had a client who was an elementary school teacher once tell me, "I don't care what kids read, as long as they are reading." That was before e-books, but I assume she would say that she didn't care how kids read, as long as they were reading, these days.

Yeah, I know I am dating myself, but damn it , these kids are always on my lawn..

Im just busting your balls a little.

Lengthy paragraph about how great paper books are and how important reading is.

Reference to campy '60s tv show.

[Danno]

I bought the tablet.

FWIW, I am not buying a kindle to supplant books or reading. My kid is 5, she doesn't even read on her own yet. But she loves books, and we read to her every night. And I have every intention to turn her into a "reader". The kindle's status as a reading device is fine, but I bought it to give her on the go access to games, videos, etc. Call me a bad parent, but a tablet is pretty helpful for my sanity on road trips, in restaurants, at (adult) friends' houses, etc. Yes, at some point in her future, I expect a book to serve that function, but it will be a while before her reading level is high enough to read books that are long enough to do that.

[Pegleg]

The two apps that my daughter uses more than any others are Dreambox (which is a huge math app that's tied to the common core curriculum - a lot of schools use it as well) and Raz Kids (which is actually a website now that I think of it, that has a ton of age-appropriate reading materials - again, used by a lot of schools). As long as both of those were available on the Kindle I'd support it. If either wasn't then that would be a deal-killer for me, since they're the only apps she uses that I actually feel good about.

[::: :::]

I wish we'd waited on the iPad mini, but its ubiquitous at his friends houses so it's not like he would have been sheltered completely from its charms. He's lobbying hard for a smart phone before 6th grade in the fall. I'm considering giving him mine and limiting data to just wifi.

[Timberridge]

related but unrelated...

We have a small bowl of candy in our house and always had since he was small. Our kid hardly ever touches it. His cousins who live in the same town but aren't allowed to have candy in their house, empty the bowl each time they come over.

[Danno]

Looks like Dreambox as an app is only available on apple devices? But it's also a website "app". But there are many other apps that are educational.

[Pegleg]

Looks like Dreambox as an app is only available on apple devices? But it's also a website "app". But there are many other apps that are educational.

Very true. I've just had a hard time finding educational apps that are any good. Dreambox is kind of unique, it was developed specifically for use in connection with the common core curriculum by schools (the Gates Foundation funded part of it) and it's really well done. Plus there are no in-app purchases; you subscribe and then you don't have to constantly deal with your kid wanting to purchase access to additional levels or goodies (which seems to be the MO of just about every other "educational" app out there).

[iceman]

Possibly completely unrelated but I needed something to stream internet radio to the stereo, I've done it in the past with an Airport Express, which works fine, but this time I bought a tablet from Amazon, the brand name is Tagital, it was $40 and it works perfect. Decent screen, pretty fast, very light and cheaply built but for $40 who gives a shit.

[Danno]

Very true. I've just had a hard time finding educational apps that are any good. Dreambox is kind of unique, it was developed specifically for use in connection with the common core curriculum by schools (the Gates Foundation funded part of it) and it's really well done. Plus there are no in-app purchases; you subscribe and then you don't have to constantly deal with your kid wanting to purchase access to additional levels or goodies (which seems to be the MO of just about every other "educational" app out there).

Gotcha. But those fuckers only developed it for ipad (which is weird if it's Gates). In any case, the kids edition kindle supposedly has great parental controls, which includes controls on in-app purchases. Which of course won't stop my kid from bugging me but...

In any case, we wanted her to have a tablet, her old one is dead, and weren't willing to throw down for an ipad. This one -- even after getting an SD card and buying the 16gb and not the 8gb -- cost under $100. So it is a good stopgap measure even if we decide we need something different down the road. And we have a plane flight coming up in 10 days, so it will be helpful to have!

[Cruiser]

Just did a quick weekend trip with my 5yo and he really enjoyed playing the kindle for a little while while we were on the plane just to pass some of the time between dropping cracker crumbs on the floor, playing drums on the tray table, spilling water on himself, and waking the fat guy in the aisle seat up so that he could make his way to the shitter for a dump.