Fun-N-Learn Phone

As my son nears kindergarten age, Applicable2U feels that it is critical that he know important phone numbers prior to starting school come the fall.  When Moms With Apps shared this parent app with their followers, I was immediately intrigued.  You just never know what life will present you, but the one thing we do know, is that it is critical that your child(ren) should know phone numbers of key family members in case of an emergency.  It’s a wonderful app that simulates using a real phone or cell phone for younger children.

Before your child(ren) can begin exploring with Fun-N-Learn Phone, a parent must enter in those contacts/phone numbers that you want your child to know by heart.  Contacts are then stored in a phonebook.  Immediately, a concern comes to mind.  What precautions have been made with this parent app in case your iTouch or iPad is lost or stolen?  The phone book is not a locked button and private information is now available to others.  Might it be possible for a future update to include locking and unlocking the phone book with a parent known passcode?  After having done all the clerical work, a user can begin learning.  Click the phone button and your child will feel as though they too have a smartphone in the palm of their hand.  Through adult to child interaction, the user is working on or reinforcing number recognition.  As you guide your child to tap each number it will make funny sounds as it becomes a visual at the top of the screen.  Children are expected to know their area code along with the seven digit number.  A note to the developer – as certain areas require you to add the one before the area code, I wonder if this might be another added feature that the next version of Fun-N-Learn Phone might see.  In order to put the call through on a real cell phone, you need to hit the green phone button, the same is true on our “pretend” phone.  If the user is correct, a written and auditory prompt is indicated.  A note to the developer – since this app might be used by non-readers, might it also be possible to have both a written and verbal prompt indicating a child’s success?  To continue practicing and/or reinforcing just hit the “x” to clear out the last phone number.

Besides this being a phone application, it is also an animal vocabulary and animal sound recognition app.  This particular part of the app confuses Applicable2U.  We are not sure how this relates to phone number recognition.  But an interesting concept that might be able to be tied in would be to have users recall the numbers of their phone number based on the animal or animal sound.  Make learning your phone number a game.  If I press the “pig, dog, lamb” this will give me my area code.  Users will continue with this memory game by then finishing up with the owl which will indicate if I dialed the correct phone number.

Overall, Applicable2U enjoyed this parent application and feel that it will certainly guide my son to know those important numbers as he goes off to school.  If you would like to learn more about  Aashima Creations be sure to visit their website here. Currently it is on the “New and Noteworthy” section of your iTunes library and is 50% off.  Spending .99 cents will be nothing compared to what it could do for your child(ren).