Top Brands: Sphero - Wonder Workshop - Makeblock - Amazon Kids
BLACK FRIDAY: Amazon Fire Kids Pro 10"
BLACK FRIDAY: Amazon Fire Kids Pro 10"
NEWS$show=/search/label/news
Here's where you'll find all the latest news about technology for children. We love to follow cool new inventions on Kickstarter and we hunt out all the latest announcements about tech toys and gadgets for the coming Christmas holidays. You'll also get our take on children's technology stories in the media.
REVIEWS$show=/search/label/review
Our kids technology product reviews are intended to help you work out whether a toy, gadget or kit is a good fit for your child or family.
There's lots of cool stuff available, but is it the right choice for the child or teenager that you are buying for?
We'll help you make the right choices and get the best value for money.
GIFT GUIDES$show=/search/label/gift%20guide
Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and friends assemble. We create gift lists to help you make good choices for kids technology which helps them develop the right skills for the future. We research the best in Coding Toys and Games, Making / Craft Tools and Kits, STEM/STEAM related gifts, Programmable Robots, Electronics Kits and Gadgets for Tech Age Kids and Teens.
PROJECTS$show=/search/label/project
Get crafty with technology. Here we'll post all our ideas and projects using technology to get creative and making with kids. You'll find anything from making a lemon battery to a glow-in-the-dark Minecraft sword. Our projects are tried and tested on our own kids or at events we run, so we are sure you can have a go at home with your kids. Some of our projects use specific tech gadgets which we provide links for you to purchase.
STEM$show=/search/label/stem
STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. In recent years there is an increased focus in these areas of study. We like to include Art and Design too, so we often talk about STEAM (A stands for Art). At Tech Age Kids we believe Coding is a new literacy and children need to understand how technology works, practice making skills and grow in their curiosity to make a better future for us all.
CODING$show=/search/label/coding
Coding is increasingly being recognised as an important skill for children to learn. Some will learn to code at school or at a coding club, but it's brilliant if they get support at home too.
ELECTRONICS$show=/search/label/electronics
We think it's really important for kids to get hands-on with electronics and learn how to make circuits and write code to control hardware.
Younger kids can start with conductive playdough. For kids who like to combine craft and tech, littleBits are fab. And we love SAM Labs wireless electronics components for making it easy for kids to make Internet of Things inventions.
Lots of electronics kits for kids have support for the Arduino microprocessor environment. The DuinoKit Jr is one of our favourites. Arduino is a fab skill for older kids and teens to develop.
ROBOTICS$show=/search/label/robotics
We love robots at Tech Age Kids, especially programmable ones. We've got lots of them and write reviews and projects that use them.
Our programmable robots for kids buying guide is a good place to start if you're not sure what's available.
Roby the mBot Meccano robot dog is one of our popular projects and has been with us to lots of events. Our Ozobot LEGO trailer is fab for kids who love LEGO and robots.
MAKING AND CRAFT$show=/search/label/making
We're advocates of the creative use of technology, but this needs to be balanced with developing physical skills such as papercraft, woodwork, clay modelling, technical drawing and soldering. If children don't develop these skills as they grow up then physical making projects can become frustrating rather than fun.
The Maker Community uses the term 'making' as a broad term to include all sorts of artisan skills or craft activities. Being able to make things can lead to life-long hobbies or even careers. It's a great feeling to be able to take a project from an idea in your head to a real object that does something.
We're particularly interested to explore products that combine maker skills with tech skills such as electronics but others focus purely on the physical making skills that are still important to modern making.
We gave our 5 year old a VTech Kidizoom Smartwatch Plus (there is now a new version- the 2nd gen Smartwatch DX) for his birthday this year. After good reports from Tracy on her kid's Kidizoom camera, we decided to give this VTech smartwatch a try.
Wearable technology has taken off this year and adult smartwatches are very much in vogue. Don't be fooled by the term "smartwatch", this VTech device is pretty much exactly like the Kidizoom camera but you wear it on your wrist and it does tell the time.
What did we think of the VTech Smartwatch Plus and is it a smart choice for kids?
UPDATE: The VTech Kidizoom Smartwatch DX 2nd generation (2016) is now smarter with more technology. This new version includes a calendar feature, calculator for basic math sums and built-in pedometer to count steps. The rest of the features and how it works, stayed the same. This definitely feels much more like a smartwatch!
Out of the Box
The Kidizoom Smartwatch Plus is packaged in a good-sized box, so will feel like a decent Christmas gift. In the box you get the watch, a Micro USB cable for charging and connecting to your computer and a comprehensive user manual.
It is the upgrade from last year's smartwatch product, which now comes in more colours (previous version was only available in blue and pink) and now can connect to the VTech Learning Lodge.
The watch seems fairly durable with a nice flexible strap and adjustable buckle to easily fit a small child's wrist. I would say the watch itself is a bit bulky for wearing all the time.
The touchscreen is responsive and my son used it intuitively tapping and swiping through the different options.
What's on the Watch?
The watch comes with 3 inbuilt games, they are fairly boring and after a couple of days, my son was ready to explore the "other" games on the Learning Lodge.
The watch face come with 50 different designs in digital and analogue displays.
There is a camera, video recorder, voice recorder, timer, alarm and stopwatch. My 5 year old hasn't quite connected with the time-telling element of the watch, but loves using the timer and stopwatch.
We've used the timer quite successfully for screen time and other timed activities. And my kids have used the stopwatch for races on their bikes in the park.
There is a little owl application on the watch which allows you to move the hour and minutes arms of the clock and when you click on the owl it will tell you the time. I do think VTech have missed an opportunity to have more games or learning applications for learning to tell the time built-in.
Camera and Video
My son loves to look through pictures on my mobile phone and so part of the reason we got him this smartwatch, was to give him something he could take photos and videos and then look through them.
The smartwatch has a low photo resolution (640 x 480 0.3MP) and so photos are grainy and small when downloaded to a computer screen. There is 128 MB on in-built memory which is shared with program data, so if your child goes crazy on taking photos and videos, you'll need to be in the habit of downloading to your computer fairly often.
Photo of Ruby, taken with the VTech Smartwatch Plus |
- Read our guide on Photo Etiquette for Kids
I actually like the fact the camera is on his wrist, as he has it to hand and can easily take a photo or video. The camera lens is located on the front top end of the smartwatch, which means you need to point it in a sideways direction to take photos. When not wearing as a watch you need to view the screen from the top and point the camera sideways to shoot. This can feel a bit awkward.
There is a separate camera button for quick access to the camera and taking photos. Once in the camera app you select if you want to take a picture or a video, however the watch will always revert to the camera when you press the camera button.
Connected
The VTech Smartwatch Plus come with connectivity to VTech's Learning Lodge. It allows you to keep a record of all your child's VTech products and usage and download more applications for their devices.
You need to download an application onto your PC or MAC (doesn't work on a Chromebook) to download games, themes and and camera effects.
We were very disappointed in the games available for the smartwatch. However, there may be scope for this to improve as more people use the smartwatch. Most of the games are free to download, however you go through a rather lengthy buying process to download them.
NOTE: Once downloaded the games appear in the Download folder on the watch and not with the other games.
There are some paid for apps, which we think are priced too high for what you get.
You don't need the Learning Lodge application to download photos and videos. Simply connect with the USB cable and transfer files like you would any other digital camera.
Usability and Durability
As mentioned before I think the watch is a bit bulky for everyday use and I don't allow my son to wear his to school. The fact there are games on the watch and you can take photos and videos seems inappropriate in a school setting.
My gut instinct is to put a protective cover on the screen, but then we are very careful with our tech as a family. The strap seems very durable and a nice fit on my kid's arm. There is a rubber cover on the input slot for the micro USB charger, which through use, may not be as durable, but only time will tell.
The watch comes with a parental control option to set a time of gameplay to either 30min, 60min, 90min or no time limit. I've set ours to 30min but it's not been an issue, as my son uses the watch mainly for taking videos of our dog Ruby!
Power and Charging
So far we've not had a problem with the smartwatch running out of battery. The user manual claims 1 day battery life for heavy use and up to 2 weeks for low usage. It is so easy to plug into a micro USB charger overnight.
There is a tiny main power switch at the back, which doesn't need to by used, as the watch come with automatic screen off which can be set in the settings. If however you are not using the watch for an extended time, they recommend turning the master switch to "off".
Age Rating
The age rating is 5 to 12 years, however we would recommend it for the younger end of this scale. With the rapid development of other smartwatches, I think big kids and tweens, would rather go for something less "kiddie". The games and application on the smartwatch certainly are not a challenge for my 5 year old to play, so I would imagine a 11 year old may find them fairly uninteresting.
Conclusion
Overall we are pleased with the VTech Smartwatch Plus, it is fun and portable device for kids. All the features included are used by the kids and hopefully as the community grows more interesting games and apps will be created for it. It is slightly bulky, but then you couldn't really have a smaller screensize to view photos and play games. We especially like the camera and video features and have used the stopwatch extensively on our outdoor adventures. We say this is a good piece of tech for kids that can be used indoors and outdoors with lots of fun factor.
Lego Creation made and photographed by 5 year old |
/fa-fire/ MONTH TRENDING$type=list
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Britannica Kids is an online encyclopaedia packed with well-researched information on a variety of topics. The site has recently been rele...
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Considering a Fitbit fitness tracker for your teen? Let's take a look at the options and see which Fitbit makes the most sense for you a...
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At Tech Age Kids we've been testing and writing about kids coding toys for over 10 years. This post is our round up of the current optio...
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/fa-dice/ RANDOM$type=blogging$m=0$cate=0$sn=0$rm=0$c=3$va=0$src=random-posts
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- angry birds
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- battling robots
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- big kids
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- careers
- catroid
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- flutterbye fairy
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- gifts
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- halloween costumes
- hardware
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- hexbug aquabots
- hexbug project
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- history
- home
- home education
- homeschool
- hot toys
- hour of code
- html
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- in app purchasing
- indiegogo
- industry event
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- kits
- kodu
- kubo
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- languages
- laptop
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- logic
- logical thinking
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- machines
- magnetic
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- makedo
- maker
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- mars rover
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- maths
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- mbot ranger
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- meccanoid
- meccanoid 2.0
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- mews
- michael faraday
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- microbit
- microcontroller
- microscope
- microsoft
- middle school
- miles kelly
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- minecraft
- minecraft mods
- mixed reality
- mobile
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- monsters university
- morse code
- mothers day
- motion capture
- motors
- mover kit
- movie
- movies
- mu
- mu toys
- munzee
- music
- my first robot
- national dog day
- nature
- new
- new year
- news
- news coding
- nikola tesla
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- ohbot
- ollie
- on the web
- opinion
- origami
- osmo
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- ouya
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- papercraft
- paperwhite
- parental controls
- parenting
- parrot
- pc
- people
- pet tech
- pets
- phone
- photography
- photon
- physics
- pi day
- picks
- pimoroni
- pinoccio
- pixel kit
- pixelart
- play
- playstation 4
- plezmo
- pocket code
- pocket money
- pokemon
- pokemon go
- poll
- pre order
- pre-teens
- prehistory
- preschoolers
- primary
- printable
- products
- professor einstein
- programming
- project
- projects
- puzzles
- python
- racing
- raspberry pi
- reading
- reivew
- remote control
- research
- resource
- resources
- retro
- review
- rights
- robot
- robot dog
- robot fish
- robot wars
- ROBOTERRA
- roboticals
- robotics
- robots
- role models
- role play
- romo
- romotive
- root
- rover
- safety
- sam labs
- samuel morse
- sandbox
- schools
- science
- scratch
- scratchjr
- screen time
- screenless
- screens
- sensors
- servos
- simbrix
- skills
- skylanders
- skylanders superchargers
- skylanders swap force
- smart pens
- smartphone
- smartwatch
- snap circuits
- social media
- solar power
- soldering
- sonic pi
- sony koov
- sound
- space
- sparki
- speaker
- speech sythesis
- sphero
- sphero mini
- spider
- star wars
- stars
- STEAM
- stem
- stikbot
- stop motion
- stop motion studio
- storage
- story
- strawbees
- students
- subscription
- subscriptions
- sugru
- summer
- swift
- tablet
- tablets
- tangible coding
- tech
- tech age
- tech craft
- tech is bad
- tech is good
- tech toys
- tech will save us
- technology
- technology will save us
- teens
- teknikio
- tekno
- teksta
- tenka labs
- tesla
- textiles
- thames & kosmos
- the extraordinaires
- tim berners lee
- tinkercad
- tinybop
- toddlers
- toot-toot
- top pick
- touch
- toy
- toys
- travelling
- TTS
- TV
- tween
- tweens
- tynker
- typing
- ux
- vehicles
- videos
- view-master
- views
- virtual reality
- voice assistants
- voice recognition
- vr
- vtech
- web
- websites
- wifi
- wii
- wii u
- windows 8
- wonder workshop
- wowwee
- writing
- writing. education
- xbox one
- xyzprinting