Educational Resources for Children

We have tried to bring together a few of the best or most useful educational resources for children, which are available on web sites or as apps.

There are many educational resources for children out there – some free and some paid for. The quality and usefulness of learning resources does vary a lot, but we have tried to compile a list of educational web sites and educational apps which we have used or which have been recommended to us.

We also have a page of educational ideas for children now being home educated due to schools being closed and also Fun and Games for children, which includes games and activities which are both educational and fun.

Education resources – websites and webpages

BBC Bitesize

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize

Bitesize provides a huge range of learning activities and educational games for different ages of children.

There are links to a few highlights below.
We really like the Food Chains games (find them in Primary Games or KS2 Science).

BBC Bitesize – KS1 Maths
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/subjects/zjxhfg8

BBC Bitesize – KS1 Science
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/subjects/z6svr82

BBC Bitesize – KS2 Science
Includes, plants, animals, microorganisms, life cycles and foodchains
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/subjects/z2pfb9q

Twinkl

Twinkl provide activity and educational worksheets and other resources for parents and schools. There are monthly subscriptions for access to downloads, but there are also a number of free resources available. You do need to create an account to gain access.
They are now providing extra free resource packs for children who are out of school.

Eden Project

Eden at home
Free resources and ideas for everyone at home.
Create a wildflower meadow in your garden, build a marble run, learn about soil, grow tomatoes, and many other learning activities.

Plant Profiles
Explore the profiles of more than 70 plants growing at Eden. Learn about plants which are common in our lives, including coffee, pineapple, olive, aloe and cashew.

STEM learning

STEM – Primary resources for home learning
How best can you support your children outside of school? Whether you’re a parent, carer or home school educator, there are a variety of activities and resources that can be used to support children?s education from home.

STEM – Primary science resource packages

Met Office

The Met Office provides learning resources for schools, looking at different aspects of weather and climate. Try How are rainbows formed? and Extreme weather.

Khan Accademy

Khan Academy – A free online learning resource for maths, science, engineering, computing and related areas. This is a non-profit organisation which aims to provide free education for everyone around the world. Probably most useful for older children and teenagers, but also covers maths from preschool upwards.

Museums

Many of the larger museums around the world allow you to see the collections online, and some offer a virtual museum, where you can move around the museum. Many of the virtual museums use Google Arts & Culture.
The Guardian recently published a guide to 10 of the world?s best virtual museum and art gallery tours.

Natural History Museum

Natural History Museum – Virtual Museum: nine ways to explore from home.

Natural History Museum – Learning resources
The Dino Dictionary has facts, figures and images for more than 300 dinosaurs.

Natural History Museum – Try this at home
Activities and ideas to occupy yourself and family at home, in your garden or local outdoor space.
Includes making a hatching dinosaur egg, making an erupting volcano, and some nature-related activities.

British Museum

The British Museum – Explore the collection
The British Museum has about eight million objects in its collection; half of these can be seen on the British Museum collection database. Enjoy some of the earliest objects created by man to works by contemporary artists and explore two million years of history.

A virtual tour of the British Museum is available, although I did have some trouble navigating around certain areas, and couldn’t always read the signs and descriptions of the items.

Educational resources – educational apps

There are lots of great educational apps available for both Android and IOS based tablets or phones. Unfortunately a great deal of these either don’t work properly or are just too annoying (with constant full screen adverts and pop-ups – which effectively prevent a young child from being able to use it).

Here are a few apps which we liked and have found useful.

To find these apps:
On an Apple phone or tablet go to the App Store and search for the name of the app.
On an Android phone or tablet, go to the Google Play Store and search for the name of the app.

Teach Your Monster To Read

The star for us at the moment is Teach Your Monster To Read, which helps young children learn to read, through a range of work games and puzzles. It begins with simple letter recognition and works up to full sentences.
Our 6 year old loves it, and he is learning to read without realising it! (Although he is having to work a bit harder now to complete each section.)
It is available as an app for Android or IOS, or can be used in a web browser.
Cost: normally ?4.99, but currently available free for a limited period of time, due to coronavirus.

Khan Academy Kids

The Khan Academy Kids app provides activities to help children to learn Maths, reading, spelling and more.
Khan Academy Kids is for children aged 2 – 7, available for Android or IOS.
Cost: free.

Educational apps – for age 5 and under

Owlie Boo

Owlie Boo provides nature and animal educational games for toddlers and young children.
There is a free app version. The games can also be played in a web browser on their website.

My Very Hungry Caterpillar

The My Very Hungry Caterpillar game is based on the classic “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” story.
The egg hatches; you feed the caterpillar, make him exercise, water his plants, play with a variety of toys, then let him sleep. Eventually he turns into a butterfly and the game starts again with a new egg, and your butterflies flying around. The pace is gentle, and the music relaxing – perfect for younger children, and easy on the nerves of adults.
Cost: free app, with options to purchase extra features.

Educational apps – learn programming

Code Karts pre-coding for kids

Code Karts introduces pre-coding to children from the age of 4. Speed through a series of logical puzzles presented in the form of a raceway.
Cost: free (10 levels), with an option to purchase a full version for more levels. Available for Android and IOS.

Lightbot: Code Hour

Lightbot is a programming puzzle game. The aim is to introduce kids to programming. Use blocks to define a series of moves to get the little bot around his environment.
Lightbot: Code Hour is a free app.
Lightbot Programming Puzzles and Lightbot jr Coding Puzzles are paid-for versions. Available for Android and IOS.

LEGO? MINDSTORMS? Fix Factory

Fix the Factory, from Lego, uses blocks to create code to guide the robot around the factory and pick up battery packs.
This is a more challenging game (the graphics are a bit dark, so it’s sometimes hard to see what’s going on), and our child has only got a few levels into it so far.
Cost: free app.

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This page is a work in progress and we will be adding more learning resources and education-related links as time goes on.

The website content or the services offered may change, and we are not responsible for the content of any websites or apps listed on our site, or the services they offer.