Learn While You Wait- Games You Can Play on Any Cell Phone

If you are a kid, waiting can be hard. Waiting while in a pediatrician’s office can be downright horrendous. Especially if you are waiting to get the dreaded flu shot. Yesterday’s family trip to pediatrician’s office for flu shots involved an hour-long wait even with an appointment. Despite being armed with a literal bag of tricks stuffed with clipboards for each child, markers, stickers, books, and snacks, the wait was still unbearable until Tech Savvy Daddy and I gave them our phones.

The novelty of a cell phone never fails. You don’t need a super fancy smart phone to engage your child in some learning while you wait. Here are some ideas that might help ease the wait and help your toddler through upper elementary age child practice some skills.

Toddlers:

• All cell phones have letters and numerals so you can engage your toddler in letter and number recognition.
• Pressing those small buttons involve fine motor skills so let them type away but keep an eye on them to make sure they actually don’t make an international call or one to fire and rescue!

Early elementary ages (grades K-2)

• Since it is important that your child knows your cell number in case of emergency, have them practice reciting it while they type
• Practice spelling using word families. Word families are words that have the same ending. For example, hat, mat, bat, cat, and rat are part of the –at family. Fit, bit, sit, hit, lit, nit, and pit end with –it. Give your child a word family and ask them to type in all the words they know that belong in that word family. Visit Mrs. Alphabet for an idea of word families and a list of words for each.

Older elementary ages (grades 3-5)

• Improve spelling by practicing blends and word families with chunks like –ime (dime, slime, grime, chime, prime, crime), -oat (boat, coat, float, gloat, throat, bloat), and -ight (height, flight, plight, fright, slight, might, tight, bright). See Mrs. Alphabet for more ideas of words that belong in each word family.
• If you can recall any of the words from your child’s spelling homework, have them type a sentence using each word.
• Tell the reception staff that you will be waiting in the hallway (where there are less germs!) and call someone who always loves to hear from your child. Not only will you make their day but your child can also practice good phone etiquette.

If you do have a smartphone, check back for reviews on my favorite iPhone apps from trusted names in education like PBS and Scholastic that can also help your child learn with characters from their favorite stories during your next long wait.

If you covet a smartphone, enter the giveaway for the T-Mobile MyTouch here.

Originial Tech Savvy Mama post. No scraping.