Trying to figure out a way to call Santa? Here’s everything you need to know
Even if you can’t have your one-on-one with Santa at the mall, you can still get your time with him. There are lots of fun options, and we’ve rounded up our favorite ways to get Santa’s phone number (many of them are free!). Here’s where you’ll learn how to get in touch with Father Christmas at the touch of your smartphone, web browser, or even your home assistant.
It couldn’t get easier to call Santa's phone number: all you need is a phone to dial up Santa’s Hotline. This free, international number connects kids directly to a voicemail box where they can leave messages at the North Pole. Available throughout the United States (as well as 13 countries including France, Sweden, and Australia), it’s a simple concept that will add that little extra pinch of magic dust to your holiday. Simply dial +1-319-527-2680 or +1-712-770-4404 and get talking!
If you have an Echo Dot Kids or FreeTime on Alexa, all you have to say is “Alexa, call Santa.” You'll hear from elves, Jack Frost, and even Santa himself (Each time it may be different, and you'll often get holiday jokes!). To make sure you're set up for FreeTime, in your Alexa app, select the Devices icon, then select the compatible Alexa device for which you would like to enable Amazon FreeTime on Alexa. Then tap FreeTime, and follow the on-screen prompts to complete your setup.
The Message from Santa app has tons of features! Parents can help their kids start a video message from Santa, receive a phone call, call Santa's voicemail, and even text the jolly old elf himself. This is a free app (with in-app purchases for additional features) and is available for iOS and Android devices.
Use your Google Assistant and Google Home device to call Santa! All you have to say is "Hey Google, call Santa" and you'll get to hear about how Santa Claus is busy rehearsing for a musical concert—but he only knows one song and needs your help! Kids can also make a call on a Smart Display to see all the fun album covers from the North Pole bands.
Christmas Dialer
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Has little Johnny and Susie been good this year? Now you can let Santa do the asking! When you use Christmas Dialer, you can choose for either Santa or one of his elves to place a call to your child. Select one of four different messages, including, "be good," "on my list," "something special," or "sweet dreams." Parents can use the pre-populated messages or type their own and then call Santa right away.
Portable North Pole
Portable North Pole
The Portable North Pole's website and mobile app let creative parents like yourself create customized Santa greetings on video to awe and excite your wee ones. With a few screen taps, answer questions about your child (or children—Santa can address your kids individually or as a group!) and upload some favorite pictures to create a charming message from St. Nick that arrives by email.
Make sure to capture all the memories—and share them with your family and friends near and far—with the Tinybeans app. The secure platform puts parents in total control of who sees and interacts with photos and videos of their kids.
From Wonder Woman to Spider-Man, comic books are having a serious moment. If you’ve got a budding comic lover in your family, now they can make comics of their own right on their phone or tablet. We found 10 apps that are easy to use, interactive and perfect for personalizing your family photos or giving school projects a fun twist. Keep reading to get the scoop on the best comic book apps for kids.
Turn your family photos into a fun comic strip with this easy-to-use app. There are filters to give your photos that classic comic book look, and you can add text bubbles and stickers to your creation. With a 4.5 rating on the App Store and over 1,500 reviews, this app is a winner.
Comic Life 3 allows you to create a full comic using its full-page templates and panel layouts. This powerful app works especially well on an iPad with a large screen; it allows you to edit all sorts of small details and add special effects. You can use photos from your library or access web photos via its Flickr integration.
Available for iPhone and iPad via App Store, $4.99
This comic book app is a little more simple, but still just as fun (and easy!) to use. The user interface takes you through each step to make professional-style comics in minutes. The fonts and word balloons were carefully chosen to look like real comic books, and there are over 1,000 decorative stickers to choose from.
This app has all the bells and whistles when it comes to creating your own personalized comic. Choose your panel layout, use your own photos, and add as many captions and dialogue stickers as your story needs. When you're through, there's an option to share via social media too.
Both kids and adults will get a kick out of this comic book app. It's simple enough that you'll get the gist in minutes and in addition to using photos, the kids can use their own drawings, too.
We love the special interactive perks of this comic book app from Duck Duck Moose. Once kids choose the scenes and characters they want, they can record their story, moving the characters as they talk. The app records the movement and kid voiceover so you not only get a personalized comic book—it's read by the author, too!
For the kid who just can't get enough of telling stories, this app has extra customizable speech balloons—and for the parent who's got Android devices, it's just right for your gear. There are all kinds of special effects, filters and panel choices too.
Formerly available as a separate app, now you can access this comic creation program right from your web browser on your phone, tablet or computer. For all those multilingual kiddos out there, we like that this website supports the creation of comics in 13 different languages. It's also free, and simple enough for even younger users. Just pick the number of frames you want to use, choose characters and add text into speech bubbles.
This app is particularly great if your family pet is just begging to be put in a comic. In a nutshell, it lets you upload photos or drawings and then add captions, sound effects, speech bubbles and other artistic effects. It's an easy way to give your family photos a digital storytelling twist.
The National Education Association’s Read Across America Day is Mar. 2 this year and the world’s first and only streaming platform that brings storybooks to life through animation is celebrating! Vooks (rhymes with books) is launching its “Read Along With Vooks” initiative, a special 7-day free preview that opens up the platform’s entire library.
From Mon. Feb. 28 through Sun. Mar. 6, kids can read anything they want on Vooks for free! Perfect for kids ages two to eight, the website helps inspire a love of reading at a young age.
As part of the “National Reading Month,” Vooks is also debuting a new friend at their special Read Along release party on Mar. 6, so be sure to mark your calendar.
Vooks is packed with animated storybooks that are specially curated for kids. Young readers and their parents can choose from books centered around SEL, STEM, vocabulary and more.
You can access Vooks available worldwide and on most devices including Apple’s iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch and Apple TV, in addition to Android platforms and devices, Roku and Amazon TV Fire Stick. If you’d like to sign up for unlimited access going forward, you can sign up for just $4.99 per month or $49.99 a year. Not sure yet? Sign up between Feb. 28 and Mar. 6 and get the entire month for free!
If you already love Lovevery’s Play Kit subscription that is packed with stage-based activities, buckle up. The brand just dropped a brand new complement to the award-winning kits, the Lovevery App!
Starting today, current Play Kits subscribers can download the iOS app (Android will soon be released in 2022) and grab oodles of content for their 0-12 month olds. Parents will have fresh “today’s picks,” digital play guides, videos, Expert Q & A features, easy DIY’s and instructions for your play kits.
One of the biggest positives about the app is that it seamlessly coincides with your baby’s age and stage. Not only that, you can easily submit your questions to an expert team and get quick responses back on topics like sleep, feeding and more.
Right now, the app is focusing on content for 0-12 month olds, with plans to expand in the future.
The plethora of topics include memory, problem solving, family life, feeding, introducing solids, communication, motor skills, parent life, play sleep, baby care and more. Head to the App Store and grab the app today!
Remember the Chatter Telephone? The rolling old school Fisher-Price phone that let you make pretend calls? What if we told you there’s a working version for adults—and it’s available to pre-order soon!
Thanks to Bluetooth and a little ingenuity, you can buy a modernized version of the Chatter Telephone that lets you make real calls. Connect your cell and it’s fully activated, routing outgoing calls through the rotary dials and incoming calls via actually picking up the handset. And yes, it still has the same looks as the OG toy!
There’s no extra phone line required and you’ll likely be glad for an excuse to set down your boring iPhone or Android. With the Chatter Telephone’s short blue aqua cord, you’re tethered in place and forced to give any caller your full attention. Just like the good old days!
Summertime is all about fun in the sun and time outdoors, but we can’t spend every day at the pool or the park. Whether you’re looking to escape the heat, the rain or the scorching sun, we have five fun-filled ways to spend a summer day indoors!
This article is presented by Google Kids Space, a new kids mode on select Android tablets that features apps, books and videos for your kids to explore, learn and have fun*. Learn more about Google Kids Space here!
Build an Obstacle Course
An at-home obstacle course is a DIY fort mixed with adrenaline! Rearrange the furniture and make your own obstacles out of household items: painter's tape is an easy way to create stepping stones and balance beams, a large cardboard box can easily be turned into a tunnel and a laundry basket and dryer balls work great for a mini game of hoops. See more obstacle course inspiration here.
Explore Their Interests with Google Kids Space
Your kids want screen time and you want to make sure it's quality screen time, with easily accessible content that’s age-appropriate, engaging and inspiring. Enter Google Kids Space, a new kids mode on select Android tablets that gives your little one a custom experience based on their age and interests and provides apps, books, and videos to spark their curiosity and discover off-screen activities*. There's even a section called Make that focuses on hands-on offline entertainment for kids, like learning to draw their favorite characters or silly science experiments they can do at home. Whether your kid is interested in dinosaurs or drawing, they’ll be able to find loads of entertaining and educational content—it's all included within Google Kids Space's library of content! Learn more about Google Kids Space here.
Get Crafty with Paper
You don’t need a ton of craft supplies to get creative! Whether you have construction paper, computer paper or yesterday’s newspaper, you have everything you need for a fun hands-on project. Try out origami, see if you can make a paper airplane or make cute matching bracelets. Get instructions for 34 easy paper crafts here.
Make Your Own Band
Sure, guitar is cool, but have you played a DIY pan flute? Get crafty by making your own instruments out of common household items like cardboard boxes, rubber bands and empty toilet paper rolls. Once you have a little practice, your kids can team up to make their own band and play some of their favorite tunes! Get instructions for 26 DIY musical instruments here.
Try an At-Home Science Experiment
DIY science experiments are the perfect combo of entertainment and education. When your kid is making their own slime or invisible ink, they’ll also be learning about polymers and oxidation! Things may get a little messy, which is why we’ve ranked our at-home science experiments on a scale of one to five sponges so you can be prepared. See 59 at-home science experiments here.
*Google Kids Space requires a Google Account for your child. Parental controls require the Family Link app on a supported Android, Chromebook, or iOS device. Books and video content not available in all regions. Video content subject to availability of YouTube Kids app. Books content requires the Google Play Books app. Availability of apps, books, and video content may change without notice. Google Assistant not available in Google Kids Space.
Whether you’re #TeamTablet or all about limiting screen time, the use of technology in little hands can be a life-saving boredom buster, enriching and fun—if you’re not having to manage your little one’s every move. EnterGoogle Kids Space: a new kids mode with content to help kids discover, create, and grow—on tablets at an unarguably incredible price point. Read on to learn more aboutGoogle Kids Space and how our editor’s kids used this new tablet experience!
If you do a Google search for tablets, you'll find a lot of options. What’s hard to find: Tablets designed specifically for kids, with expertly curated content and a straightforward design that kids as young as three can understand. That's whereGoogle Kids Space comes in! To create a one-of-a-kindtablet experience that encourages kids' curiosity, Google teamed up with children’s education and media specialists, teachers and other experts to handpick games and books. The kids mode also recommends videos that spark creativity and play. Paired with the easy-to-use parental controls fromGoogle Family Link, it's a win-win for families.
Curated Content
S. Massey
When setting upGoogle Kids Space on your child's tablet profile, your child has the opportunity to select areas of interest, such as sports, cooking, animals, science and more. On their home screen, they'll find content suggestions based on their selected interests. They can easily navigate among the homepage (with new recommendations every day), "Play" (teacher-approved apps and games that are age-appropriate), "Read" (handpicked books), "Watch" (videos from YouTube Kids), and "Make" (videos that encourage offline play). Parental controls that you've set up for your child's Google account managed with Family Link are applied to the curated content that your child might select. Bonus: If your kids are sharing a tablet, each child can have their own profile so they'll be able to customize their own interests! Google Kids Space is best suited for kids aged 3 to 8.
Smart & Easy Parental Controls
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More independence for them with less worry for you:Google Family Linkhelps parents manage their child’s device. Parents can download the free Family Link app on compatible Android, iOS, and Chrome OS devices.Family Link helps parents do things like allowing or blocking apps on a child's device or setting time limits—all from their own phone. The best news: Since you control the settings through your child's Google account on this tablet, you'll be setting the guardrails for any time your child logs into his or her Google account.
Bottom line: Google Kids Space and Family Link transform tablets into multi-functional, super practical and easy-to-use devices.
Our Experience
S. Massey
In a household with four children ranging in age from 3 to 12, Google Kids Space was a hit with everyone. Since we could easily set up a custom profile for each kid, everyone got to enjoy the tablet and was able to find fun content that fit their age and interests. Once we had her profile set up—which only takes a few minutes—our littlest one was able to navigate between Sesame Street and Peppa Pig videos with only a minimal amount of frustration! When the tablet is open to her account, the home screen has suggestions picked for her, which means she spent more time actually using apps instead of asking us to help her pick a game (and another game after she changes her mind and another after that).
Even though our three year old and 7 year old were using the tablet, which would usually get some resistance about it being a toy for little kids, we got zero complaints about having the same device! When our son was in his profile, he was able to set his interests for vehicles and animals instead of princesses—giving him a very different experience than his sister—and the apps like Code Karts and home screen features like interesting animal facts let him feel like the tablet is for big kids. We had two tablets, but, with different profiles, we could easily take just one with us for traveling!
* Google Kids Space requires a Google Account for your child. Parental controls require the Family Link app on a supported Android, Chromebook, or iOS device. Books and video content not available in all regions. Video content subject to availability of YouTube Kids app. Books content requires the Play Books app. Availability of apps, books, and video content may change without notice. Google Assistant not available in Google Kids Space.
If music is the food of love, then tune-loving kids and parents alike will swoon over the veritable smörgåsbord of fantastic music-making apps available on the market today. From classical creators to hip-hop jams, we sampled an entire marching-band-worth of apps (so you don’t have to) and discovered the grooviest ones. Check out our ensemble of apps below—your kids will be joining in on the rhythm nation in no time.
Melody Jams
Preschool rock-and-rollers will really dig Melody Jams, a fun, interactive music-making game that lets players animate and orchestrate their own garage band comprised of adorably-drawn monster characters. Band members can be mixed and matched, with each character possessing unique personality traits and different instrument skills, which are described in detail on the Melody Jams website. Additional music and scene bundles are available for purchase via iTunes for $4.99.
Aspiring DJs will have a blast mixing and scratching their own custom beats and tunes with Crayola’s nicely-designed music app. Created in partnership with mobile game developer Legacy Games, Crayola DJ features a well-laid-out interface of dual virtual turntables that junior Junior Vasquezes can use to mix and remix almost 100 exclusive tracks—all created by professional DJs. Tracks are available in five musical genres, including hip-hop, dance, pop, fusion and holiday, and a tempo slider lets users adjust BPMs to take their mixes from chillout deep house to frenetic EDM. Regardless of your mini-DJ’s level of musical experience or sound-engineering skills, the app intelligently creates legit professional-sounding dance music that invariably will get people on their feet and moving to the beats.
Combining two activities that kids love (painting and music) Kapu Bloom Tunes lets kids paint the world with music. This sweet digital toy may seem simplistic—there are no recording or sharing options—but young musicians will delight in seeing how their finger paintings are brought to life through colors and sounds. Players dig for, find, then decorate the seeds of a melody flower, which are planted in the ground. By painting the soil and watering the seeds, the resulting plants bloom with music. Tickling plants causes them to sing a variety of familiar melodies and nursery rhymes, and spinning petals leads to even more musical interludes.
This delightful music-making app is designed for preschoolers and older, and lets them explore how sounds are made using a variety of different, ordinary household objects, such as an empty soda bottle or a rubber band. Kids can listen to and learn how to play sounds created with virtual homemade instruments, at the same time developing a better understanding of how sounds are made in the real world. The app’s simple, intuitive interface makes it perfect for younger users, and the ad-free play environment makes it easy on parents’ wallets, too.
Although it’s not precisely a music-making app per se, Adventures of Poco Eco—Lost Sounds is a dreamy and visually-stunning music-adventure game that’ll have you and your kids hooked from the start. Featuring straightforward puzzles and a gorgeous electronic soundtrack composed by acclaimed Hungarian musician and artist Iamyank, players are drawn into a mesmerizing neon wonderland where they are tasked with helping an explorer named Poco Eco complete his mission of finding the lost sounds of his tribe. This multi-award-winning app is less like a typical puzzle-adventure game and more like a meditative musical journey across a dozen 3D-animated game levels.
For ages 6 & up. Available for iOS, $3.99, and Android, $2.99.
Loopimal
Take one part plug-and-play music maker and one part covert coding tutorial and the results would be Loopimal, a cool digital building app that lets nascent electronica musicians create neat animations powered by sounds. Users can create music loops by using pre-programmed blocks that provide both melodies and character animations that can be layered over various beats. With its easy-to-use interface, kids can learn how arranging and repeating blocks in certain sequences can add up to different sounds and movements of cutely-illustrated animals, including a bear, a pig, an octopus, a sloth, a bird and a yeti. Although the app is missing save and share options, young users will enjoy experimenting with sounds and animations in this entertaining app.
Conceived by musician and educator Michael Emenau, Easy Music is premised on the theory that before kids can effectively learn how to play music, they first need to learn how to listen to it. Through this appealing, interactive app, kids learn how to recognize notes, pitch, rhythm and melody by exploring different animated worlds and interacting with a color-coded keyboard that helps budding musicians begin the journey toward playing music by ear. Bonus: there are no ads or in-app purchases, a welcome relief from the growing deluge of overly commercialized mobile apps aimed at kids.
For ages 5 & up. Available for iOS, $3.99 and Android, $10.99.
Magic Piano
From classical to contemporary pop, Magic Piano has gamified tickling the virtual ivories. The app even makes someone who’s all thumbs sound like a piano prodigy. Players follow beams of onscreen lights, which guide fingertips to hit the right notes. Rhythm and tempo can be adjusted to suit a player’s fancy, adding his or her own sense of musical style to some familiar and not-so-familiar songs. There’s also an option to switch instrument modes, which range from baroque harpsichord to new wave synthesizer. The app supports 13 languages and the premium music catalog currently boasts more than 1,000 songs, with new songs added daily. For those who want access to the entire songbook, subscription plans start at $2.99 weekly.
For ages 5 & up. Available for iOS and Android, free with in-app purchases.
Medly Music Maker
Downloaded more than half a million times, award-winning Medly Music Maker already has been named to numerous “Best of” lists, including Apple’s Editor’s Choice and Best App of 2016. The free version of the app comes with 12 instruments, with 100 more—ranging from house synths to classical violins, and hundreds of drum and FX samples—available through in-app purchases. Amateur and professional musicians alike can create songs in a variety of genres through a simple visual interface where notes are drawn onscreen. The app is compatible with Apple Watch, allowing users to open, play and control Medly-created songs directly from their wrists.
For ages 10 & up. Available for iOS, free with in-app purchases.
Keezy
Addictive and delightful are just two words to describe Keezy, a quirky musical instrument-slash-sound sampler app that helps wannabe beatboxers of all ages create and record their own custom beats and loops with just a few taps. Keezy comes pre-loaded with 15 sound boards—created by popular alternative musicians, including Reggie Watts, Tegan and Sara, The Mast, Francis and the Lights, and Reni Lane—which can serve as the basis for users’ musical creations. Additional sounds can be recorded on each of the eight colored tiles, which are tapped to play back or pressed and held to loop. There’s also a free companion Drummer app from Keezy for those who want to take their beats to the next level.
Helping kids explore their ever-evolving interests and creating opportunities for them to flex their creativity muscles can sometimes feel like a full-time job. It can feel especially challenging when you’re trying to balance all this uber-enriching parenting work with responding to emails, getting dinner on the table and making sure everyone has clean laundry for the morning.
Thanks to Bennett Live, inspired by the educational style of Bennett Day School, you can now give your kids access to a vast library of engaging media, programming, and educational resources that will help them explore, learn and create independently—all from their favorite device!
Bennett Live offers a unique way to help kids stay busy and keep on growing and thriving at home. Unlike other apps that rely on fully-screen-based games to teach new skills, Bennett Live invites kids, ages 3-18, to immerse themselves in engaging pre-recorded media content. Every episode includes a project or activity to create, a unique learning guide and all the extra resources your kiddo will need to dig deep (and stay busy.)
After months of a little (okay, a lot) more screen time than usual, we all know that not all screen time is created equally. Kids’ brains respond differently when they have access to apps they can use independently and that offer them real opportunities to develop their growth mindset, creativity, problem-solving and social-emotional skills, physical growth and literacy skills.
With partners like the Adler Planetarium, the Lincoln Park Zoo, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, and game companies like SpinMaster, USOPOLY, and Wonderful Idea Co., you won’t ever have to spend a frantic evening trying to schedule expensive one-off classes to fill tomorrow morning again. The experts are all on Bennett Live and, while we're pretty sure your kid won’t burn through the 110,000 hours of viewable content that’s already on the app, new content is being added consistently!
All kids deserve access to high-quality, creative and hands-on learning experiences, and Bennett Live is already helping to make this sort of learning possible for so many families (ummm, over A MILLION people so far) who are working and learning remotely.
If Bennett Live sounds like something you’ve been dreaming of (whenever you get to sleep these days anyway), you’re in luck because it’s easy to sign up for a free 7-day trial. Once you and your kiddo see all it has to offer, we know you’ll be ready for more!
Bennett Live is now available from Google Play (for Android) and the App Store (for iOS). After a 7-day free trial, families can subscribe for $9.99/month or $79.99 a year.
More than ever before, there is so much tech in our hands and our homes. It’s pretty cool to have the world at your fingertips, but with that comes extra responsibility, especially when it comes to our kids and tech. Not sure where to start? Google, our favorite search engine, has our back yet again! They’ve put together this informative hub with articles containing simple instructions on keeping in control of your kids’ online experience. Check out these five excellent online parental controls. Looking for more? Explore the Parental Controls section of the new Google Families hub.
1. Parental Controls on Nintendo Switch
Nintendo Switch is a massive hit with kids of all ages, but did you know there’s a Parental Controls app for the Switch? Game changer! You can set play-time limits, learn how to turn off voice chat on the Switch system and turn off other social features. You can also learn how to limit mature content, which will prevent kids from playing mature-rated games. Wondering how your kid got that new game on their Switch and then you get the credit card bill? Not to worry, you can learn how to restrict Nintendo eShop purchases and block spending and auto-renewals on both the Nintendo eShop and on Nintendo.com.
No matter your child's age, it's important to establish your family's rules for the digital playground. Google's Family Link app helps parents establish boundaries and healthy internet habits with their families, so kids can safely explore with technology. This free app gives parents all kinds of additional controls for their kid's Android and Chromebook devices—setting screen or app limits, viewing where they're spending their time online, blocking or allowing apps, seeing where their device is currently located and even remotely locking a device when it's time to take a break!
Some may argue that Netflix is the best thing since sliced bread, and we agree. With so many choices for all ages and interests, it’s a goldmine of entertainment. Create a password for each kid. Now they can only access their account, and you set controls as you see fit. You can then enable the Netflix Kids experience, limiting what they can view based on age and even adding title restrictions.
Too much of a good thing? You have the power to set time limits on Apple devices too! Just go into Settings > Screen Time and select your child's device to get reports on what apps they're using and how often they're using them. Once you set your passcode, you can set limits for downtime (so necessary!), how long apps can be used, which contacts your kids can get in touch with and even block content, purchases and downloads.
Kids love asking Alexa about all kinds of things, and we agree, it's pretty fun. But don't forget to set some limits with your robot pal. It's easy! Enable the Amazon Kids Settings in your Alexa app. Once you've added it, you can manage the settings either through the app or by logging in to your Amazon account and going to your Parent Dashboard.
