Kids can spend hours and hours on different gadgets, keeping their hands and minds occupied with apps, games, and videos. But there’s more than just TikTok and YouTube to keep your children entertained—there are lots of educational games and apps that you can download to ensure they’re having fun while learning something new!
And if you want to cut down on screen time altogether, you can always go the old-fashioned route and opt for board games, which teach soft skills such as communication, problem-solving, and collaboration.
So whichever path you choose, the list below will help you find fun educational games for kids, with both online and traditional options.
Reading Games
These reading games are primarily aimed at pre-readers or early readers. They focus on the skills these kids need to cement pre-reading or early reading skills, as well as early arithmetic knowledge.
Wallykazam Letter & Word Magic
Available on: App Store
Price: Free
This smartphone app prompts kids to search for letters, trace letters, build towers using rhyming words, and complete other activities at different levels.
Sight Word Hopper
Available on: education.com
Price: Free
This online game will strengthen your child’s recognition of sight words. Kids help the character Cuz-Cuz jump over the correct mud puddle, which features a sight word dictated by the narrator.
Math Games
These games help build early arithmetic skills and range from pre-K to middle grade levels.
Flower Garden with Curious George
Available on: PBSKids.org
Price: Free
This math game helps preschoolers cement their counting skills. Curious George plants flowers and asks the player to click on each flower to count them.
Buzz Math
Available on: Buzzmath.com
Price: $60 per year, $40 per quarter, or $20 per month
Ages: 8 to 12
This middle grade math game challenges your child to solve math problems in order to advance to the next level. The premise is the players help an inventor named Alfred to save Mathlantis by restoring the people’s knowledge of math.
One caveat, though: the free trial of the “game” looks more like digitalized worksheets, without any glimpse of the game’s premise.
Flipping Pancakes Fractions
Available on: education.com
Price: Free
Help your child grow their understanding of fractions by playing this fun fractions game, in which they will have to flip the specified portion out of the total number of pancakes.
Prodigy Math Game
Available on: Prodigy
Price: Free
In this free math game, your child will need to answer math questions in order to defeat the enemy, similar to role-playing games like Pokemon.
Science Games
Introduce kids to the exciting world of science using these interactive games.
Base Builder
Available on: PBSKids.org
Ages: Preschool
Price: Free
In this game, your child will build bases for astronauts, challenging their spatial reasoning skills in order to complete the task.
Animal Jam
Available on: Android, iOS
Ages: 6 to 12
Price: Free
Created in partnership with the National Geographic Society, this science game lets your child become their favorite animal, decorate their own den, play fun games, and chat with friends. The videos and downloadable e-books help them learn more about the natural world.
Toca Life: Farm
Available on: TocaBoca.com
Price: Free
In this game, your child will gather eggs, raise crops, and milk cows in a farm setting. Different locations offer different activities for never-ending fun.
Gamestar Mechanic
Available on: GamestarMechanic.com
Price: Free for 30 days
Gamestar Mechanic is a series of game-based courses and quests that help your kids learn game design and how to make their own video games.
Social Studies Games
These games will introduce kids to important figures from history and teach them more about ancient civilizations.
On the Trail of Captain John Smith
Available on: National Geographic Kids
Price: Free
In this game, your child gets to explore the world with Captain John Smith through a series of videos and mini-games.
Zeus the Mighty
Available on: National Geographic Kids
Price: Free
In this online game, help Zeus the mouse get to the top of Mount Olympus by jumping up the platforms and answering questions about ancient Greece.
The Time Tribe
Available on: TheTimeTribe.com
Price: Free to try
This point-and-click adventure game created by an educator and anthropologist includes fun challenges to complete as players earn rewards and unlock story bits.
Educational Board Games and Card Games
Whether you want your kids to take a break from gadgets or you just want to have some good old-fashioned family fun, these board and card games are a great way to start:
Big Letter Bananagrams
A preschool-version of the world-acclaimed Bananagrams, Big Letter Bananagrams comes with tiles that are 50% larger than the classic. This can help your preschooler to identify letters, match them, and spell their name.
Raccoon Rumpus
This educational board game lets your preschooler dress the raccoon in different costumes, teaching them colors, counting, and matching.
1-2-3 Farmyard
In this math board game, players hurry to complete a farm from the animal cards they get from the deck. The game will help your child practice identifying and comparing numbers and counting.
Robot Turtles
Who says you need a computer game to teach programming? In this board game, you can introduce even preschoolers to the logic in computer science! Players move the robot turtle around the board according to code cards.
Uno
This classic card game is a great way to train preschoolers to match colors and numbers, and even teach simple strategy decisions for using wild cards.
Spot It! Basic English
A family favorite, this card game involves looking for the one item that appears in any two cards set on the table. The Basic English version comes with sight words that can challenge your beginning reader.
Lakeshore Allowance Game
In this board game, children get to practice basic skills involving money, such as managing it and prioritizing what to purchase. They can also practice math skills like adding and subtracting, as well as making change.
In a Pickle
This middle-grade card game features a noun on each card, and on their turn, players add a card to the pile on the table. They need to explain how the noun in the card they are covering can be put inside the item on the card they are laying down, which challenges vocabulary and communication skills.
Once Upon a Time
This storytelling game lets players combine events, places, characters, and other elements found on their cards to formulate a story.
Any player can interrupt the original storyteller by playing a card from his own hand, and claiming the storyteller role. Each player needs to make sure the story ends in a way that the ending card makes sense.
Playing Educational Games
Playing educational games is a great way for kids to have fun while also learning important skills. If your child likes playing games on the phone or tablet, pick some of these to add to their collection so you can rest assured that they’re learning something while playing.
You can also add some of these board and card games to the mix to encourage family play time away from gadgets!
Did you find this post helpful? Let us know in the comments below!
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Yen Cabag is the Blog Writer of TCK Publishing. She is also a homeschooling mom, family coach, and speaker for the Charlotte Mason method, an educational philosophy that places great emphasis on classic literature and the masterpieces in art and music. She has also written several books, both fiction and nonfiction. Her passion is to see the next generation of children become lovers of reading and learning in the midst of short attention spans.
