KidSmart is an app designed to improve a child’s English, Mathematics and 11+ skills and it caters for aged four to eleven years old. The app tailors the experience to match the child’s pace and incorporates gamification to stimulate learning.
This app will be available from the App Store with a monthly payment plan. There are three different plans to cater to your needs: Primary, 11+ and Primary & 11+. The Primary plan is aimed at reception to Year 6, whilst 11+ cover topics on CEM 11+ / GL 11+. As you may have guessed, the Primary & 11+ consists of both these plans listed above. We have been testing out their Beta app which includes topics on Primary & 11+ plan.
What I love about this app is that my children can access it on the device where ever and whenever they want, especially before school, before bedtime and out & about. Over the years, we have tried a number of methods for tutors including where I had to bring my children to the tuition centre, the tutor came to us, I took my children to the tutor’s home and online 11+ courses etc. Much of that was quite time consuming especially all the driving and waiting, and to ensure it fits around our busy lifestyle. Now with the app, they can have additional learning with the bonus of it being flexible to our schedules.
Once you have set up your child’s profile, there will be a list of worksheets for them to do. They can choose to do one each day or do as many as they want. Each worksheet covers different topics, for example, vocabulary, word relationships and usage, grammar and maths problem-solving.
Each worksheet comes in a well-balanced set of questions. It takes my children a few minutes up to 10 minutes to complete these. They are not too lengthy nor boring. Each time they complete a worksheet they get a reward with points that can earn them a trophy or stickers. In between, there are videos to watch or games to play, with some fun facts included. Both of my children love the rewards they have achieved and have been competing with one another. I find this competitive behaviour very healthy.
I tend to do the worksheet with my daughter as she needs help to understand some of the questions. On the right side of the worksheet, there are useful tools to help your child along. There are hints given to help the child to understand or they can use their ‘virtual coins’ to buy an explanation. Your child can look up the meaning of the words easily via the Oxford dictionary. They can also listen to the questions by clicking on the speaker button to hear an audio recording. Some questions will have video etc. They can swipe left to bring up a notepad to work their sums. I find it very useful and helpful.
On the parental controls, you get to check the progress on each subject by topics and sub-topics. Identify the topics that your child needs help with and then customise the learning plan. The app uses adaptive technology to work out the right difficulty level for your child but parents have the additional control to do the adjustment. If at any point the child feels stuck, just relax the difficulty level. You get to review the child’s progress with regards to various attributes like speed, accuracy, concentration etc. You can also reward your child with real gifts by adding that gift to the app and set a target to motivate the child.
The app is very appropriate for my children’s educational level. We are still testing out their Beta app which occasionally has some minor teething problems, but other than that, it all works well and it is very well thought-out. For more information, please check out their website https://kidsmartapp.co.uk/ or Facebook page https://facebook.com/kidsmartapp/.
Disclosure: We were allowed early access to this app and will get a free subscription for the purposes of writing this review, however, all thoughts and opinions remain our own. Images used with permission.
