October 11, 2007

Dear Parents: Save Some Money, Use Kindersay.

Michael Arrington

43 comments »

One thing that amazes me when I visit friends who have young children is the stunning amount of cash they lay out on educational toys and videos. Parents will pay literally anything if they think their kids will learn something and get a head start over the competition. Companies take advantage of that need people have to be perfect parents and sell them every conceivable type of educational toy and video, at ridiculous prices.

But you can stop the vicious cycle of spending with…the Internet. Once your child has mastered Elmo’s Potty Time (let me know how it ends if you watch it all the way through, I stopped at Earl the fruit guy because he quite frankly creeped me out), give Kindersay a whirl. It shows pictures of things or letters and an actress (Christine Ghawi, who stars as Céline Dion in the CBC Canadian show Céline) says the words. It’s free and has no advertising. If you want to add in your own family pictures to customize the show, they charge $6/month.

The next time you’re too busy to actually spend time with your kid, just plop them down in front of the computer, fire up Kindersay and let them do their thing. They’ll grow up to be smart, considerate, well adjusted kids. I’m sure of it.

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  1. Duncan Riley

    As a parent of a 5 year old I’d note there are a lot of choices in this space. Uptoten offers some great games like this, and if you don’t mind the commercialism lego.com, hotwheels.com, Bob The Builder and even The Wiggles offer similar functionality.

  2. Michael Arrington

    yeah cool. we’ll get mark working on a roundup post. heh.

  3. Hsien Lei

    You guys laugh but how’s a parent supposed to get any work done unless our kids are sitting next to us on their own computer henpecking the keys? Not to mention that our computer savvy children will surely kick butt. *snort*

    One of our favorite kids sites is: BBC’s Cbeebies. If you do a round-up, I bet it’ll be one of your most popular posts. Let me know if you want me to write a guest post, Duncan. ;)

  4. trehus

    I would not like my children spending too much time infront of the computer especially for kindergardens.

  5. Hsien Lei

    Well, trehus, you’ll be appalled then that most well-funded schools have regular laptop sessions for kids as young as kindergarten. The computer is becoming as common and vital as the toilet. Parents who think they should or can keep their kids from it might as well have an outhouse. After all, a toilet and outhouse serve the same function and the latter may be more environmentally friendly!

  6. Mo Kakwan

    I’ve seen a 5 year old play halo (very well too!)… Can this really hold a kid’s attention?

  7. Michael Arrington

    Well, of course. Any kid not playing Halo by 5 is under developed, right? I think this is more pre-school age stuff, but what the hell do I know about this? Absolutely nothing.

  8. Hsien Lei

    Sorry to be all over this comment thread here but this former toy and kids stuff reviewer just can’t help it!

    Anyway, in response to Mo, these websites are not only good at holding a child’s attention while they’re active on the site, they’re also great fodder for firing imagination afterwards. For example, you can print activity sheets from some of these website and it fuels my five-year-old imagination so much that he makes some amazing (if I do say so myself) LEGO creations and drawings based on what he’s seen and done on the sites. So it’s not just about screen time, it’s about inspiration off time as well.

  9. trehus

    Hsien Lei,

    I don’t see why kids need a laptop for? Sorry if you are the kind of parents allows childen to play games all day.

  10. Duncan Riley

    Hsien Lei
    first: we have multiple computers, indeed my son has my old ex-Win XP MCE box to himself, it’s school holidays here and despite offering him a bike ride today he told me that the sun is too hot and he’d rather be on hotwheels.com (it was only 23!)

    I’ll have to check out that site. To give you an idea how bad his computer addiction has gotten, he even worked out how to set a lego.com image as the default wallpaper. I really should buy him an iMac, maybe for christmas, I don’t want him growing up as a Windows user :-)

  11. chris

    Michael,

    I can’t believe you do not mention http://www.starfall.com … absolutely no ads, and paid by the folks that built and sold Bluemountain.com to Excite back in the 90s.

  12. Hsien Lei

    trehus: You’re obviously not a parent on top of which you don’t have a clue about child ed not to mention what’s allowed in my house. Besides, genetics trumps all. ;) (Check my website for my area of expertise before you say anything else.)

    Duncan: Mine gets our hand-me-downs and is working off a Fujitsu P Series Lifebook right now purchased in 2004. He’ll be getting my Dell Inspiron 9300 sometime in the new year when get a new one for myself. Clearly, we’re in the Windows camp. heh A friend of mine said that her 6-year-old niece loves the iMac.

  13. Michael Arrington

    Chris - Yeah, well, they’ll get over it.

  14. Mike

    These kids sites are so sick. Why get kids if you have no time for them?

    Our kids are not allowed to use the computer for more than an hour per WEEK (even so the oldest is 12).

    And hey, even without computer (or because?) they are among the best in their class.

  15. Michael Arrington

    Mike - yeah, but I bet they suck at Halo.

  16. Hsien Lei

    “best in their class”

    Only because our computer toting children aren’t in the same school as yours.

    I kid! I kid!

    Kind of.

  17. Andy

    I can understand parents not wanting there kids to be playing Halo all day but why wouldn’t you want your kids to be learning how to use computers, the internet(monitored), and educational programs at a young age? It seems like the next logical step in K-12 education.

  18. David

    Ok, so I check it out. I found it slightly disturbing. Sure, she’s got great poise and pronunciation, but her presentation would scare me if I were a 5 year old…you can just tell she’s trying to not feel uncomfortable blurting out a word and then smiling.

  19. Shams

    How could you suggest to put your children in front of pcs. Is it healthy? Do you know how many children dies in China because of dehydration as they spend too much time on pcs. This is absolutely not a good artilce to support. You guys not only run after money. Think. There are other ways to earn more rather than such evil advises.

  20. Amit Agarwal

    Mike, you are a star. As a parent of a 2+ year old, can’t thank you enough.

    Just recorded a 30 second video clip of my son using Kindersay on my second computer. He’s loving it absolutely.

  21. Al Gore

    Hey Michael,

    It’s Vicious Circle NOT Cycle.

    Please correct.

    Regards,
    Al Gore

  22. vozome

    >The next time you’re too busy to actually spend time with your kid, just plop them down in front of the computer,

    What? and what am I going to do with my TV??

    seriously though, I only let my kid (3 yo) play with computers exceptionnally and he knows his way around way better than his mom (who’s not that interested in the whole stuff), I guess that’s pretty standard for all kids in his generation. In our time, we had to deal with command lines and monochrome display…

  23. ripple024

    to the people complaining about your child sitting in front of a computer…how is this any different than electronic toys that encourage learning? i have a 3yr old son and i cannot wait to work through some of this with him. i will be there with him as we work on his letters…so what’s the problem? too many conspiracy theorists ruin the pot….

  24. michelle

    Hmm, having developed kids media for ages I’m wondering what’s so ‘ridiculous’ about the $19.99 price for the DVD product you’ve called out in this post?

  25. Chris Hemphill

    One interesting children’s product I have seen is the Easy Link Internet Launch Pad from Fisher Price http://www.fisher-price.com/fp.....;pid=41685 which has interchangeable characters which you press to take you to their website. Elmo is the example where you press Elmo, and it takes you to sesameworkshop.org not allowing you to visit any other sites. My son which just turned 3 has loved in the past to sit with me and play the games on these kid friendly sites. Duncan you are right there are many other great sites out there as well, such as Cailou.

  26. Daniel

    I don’t think the point of the website(s). Is to sit your kid in front of them and leave. The point is to give you another resource to sit with your kid and encourage them to learn.

    My son is 6, he learned to spell his name by typing (He could type his name well before he could write it.) He can log into websites that require username and passwords. He EXCELS in school. He is also in Cub Scouts and plays T-Ball. He is probably a little above average, but most is attributable the fact, that my wife and I do ALL of these things with him. We don’t let them substitute for us, we make them compliment us.

  27. Bob Myers

    Can we lose the ads on the RSS feed (the ones from Dell)? They’re too big and distracting and appear on every single post–which last time I checked was not considered best practices for RSS ads.

    Bob

  28. Steve

    I noticed as the URL’s were loading that the service is hosted on Amazon - it truly does make it easy to start a site from scratch and scale without worrying about it.

  29. Louis-Eric

    Good going Christine ! Although I don’t think this presentation is exactly testing the breadth of her repertoire, know that this girl is freakishly talented.

  30. phenom

    I don’t have kids, so why bother visiting the site.

    http://vidsonly.blogspot.com

  31. Marc Miles

    WOW, they f’d up. Kids must lean in CAPITAL LETTERS first not lowercase (from the screenshot). Every preschool teacher knows that. IDIOTS!

  32. Don Wilson

    haha, I like they leaved the chain on the camels front feet for the picture.

  33. sc

    With Sesame street, you know that tons of research has gone into whether the teaching media is effective or not. With teaching tools like this one, there is really no evidence that proves that this is effective or better than alternative modes of kids teaching/entertainment out there.

  34. Dennis

    Elmo remembers one time….

  35. Dave Q

    Another vote for http://www.starfall.com…

    It has kept my daughter from bugging us while we’re busy finishing our garage web 2.0 startup ;)

    Will take Kindersay for a spin as an alternate.

  36. oded

    Hi

    I think i have the best gift to your preschool kids..

    http://www.poissonrouge.com/

  37. Fabian Schonholz

    My kids have had access to a computer for years. Normally they would share it with my wife or if I had a spare Linux box they would use that - as a side note, in 25+ years of using computers I have never ever owned or worked or contemplated using Windows; only time I was “asked” to do it I quit. Last Hanucha I bought them a MacBook laptop each and they do all sort of stuff now.

    The funny part is that we do not restrict access to computers, TV or video games. Once they finish their homework they can do what they want. So, you would think that they would watch TV or play video games? Not our kids. They might watch a little TV or play games, but for the most part, they grab a book and read. Of course they games and go to authorized sites, but in a very complementary way to their primary book reading. BTW, one of my kids is honor roll and the other well on her way.

    The point, however long, I am trying to make is that sites like this a great. They do help the kids develop in the moder world. One of my kids teachers was concerned about his handwriting. My position was: Why? He will mostly type!!

    I wish there were more sites for kids between 8 and 12 that were fun, educational and SAFE.

  38. RaJesh Anandakrishnan

    Mike, This is a nice site. In our case we collected videos from you tube & updated in a blog. This is the blog I created for my Son Adithya.

    http://kidslikeit.blogspot.com/ This blog is dedicated to my son.

  39. Kishore Balakrishnan

    Dear Michael

    A feature within the comments that will help with any round up post.

    Let users sort/rate comments using Scriptaculous Lists with PHP ( http://www.gregphoto.net/sortable/ )

    See an example @ http://www.namastenetizen.com/.....g=colophon

    I would sort the other useful sites / comments to the top and our collective sorted comment list could be the ( starting point for your ) round up post :-)

    Cheers, Kishore.

  40. Steve Ballmer

    No advertising cigartees!

    http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com

  41. Hsien Lei

    Fabian makes a great point. Kids know how to self-moderate. Too much of anything gets boring after a while. I think strict restrictions (although I do believe in teaching restraint) leads to unhealthy desire. Also, children mimic their parents. If you don’t want your kids glued to the TV or computer, set an example and don’t do it yourself!

  42. Nik Kalyani

    I have to second the vote for UpToTen.com. The site is phenomenal. I started my kid off at 1-yr on UpToTen using a wireless keyboard with the Berchet Baby Keyboard overlay. Now she has graduated to using a Fujitsu TabletPC (finally…a great use for a TabletPC) with two apps — UpToTen (off-line) and TuxPaint.

    TuxPaint is phenomenal…it’s a free, Open Source paint program for kids (www.tuxpaint.org). It has hundreds of cool “stamps”…basically clipart that kids can draw on and around.

    Among the many benefits for my kid from using computers — improved hand/eye coordination, alphabet and number recognition, foreign words, improved imagination and story-telling, time awareness…the list goes on.