Free learning games for kids

What are learning games for kids

A learning game turns one school skill into something a child can touch and try again. Instead of a worksheet, there are ladybirds to count, a clock hand to drag, a pizza to cut into quarters or a rocket that climbs with every correct key. The child gets an answer wrong, sees what happened and has another go, which is how most of us learn anyway.

The kids and learning games on Kiloo are made for ages four to ten and share the same shape. A big button on the title screen picks 4+, 6+ or 8+, and the content grows with each tier. For the youngest there is little or nothing to read: an animated hand shows each new kind of task the first time it appears. A wrong answer just wobbles, and after a second try the right one lights up, so nobody gets stuck. Stars, a learned meter, a sticker book and a daily sticker give a child something to collect.

Kids learning games to start with

For numbers, start with Number Garden. Children count ladybirds, plant one seed per tap and put number stones in order, from numbers to five at 4+ up to a hundred at 8+, with a snail acting out every task. Sum Slide is mental arithmetic on a snowy mountain: three penguins hold up answer cards and the right one slides down to the finish. It runs from adding within ten with dots to times tables and sharing. Fraction Pizza has a chef mouse who needs pizzas cut into fair halves, thirds and quarters, and at 8+ it reaches mixed numbers.

For letters, Letter Catch has a bear catching letters on drifting balloons, from letters with pictures at 4+ to longer words and A to Z order at 8+. Type Rocket is a first typing game: press the glowing key and the rocket climbs towards the moon.

For the world around them, Clock Shop teaches the time with real clock hands, from o'clock and half past to exact minutes and 24-hour clocks. Shape Sorter posts shapes through a sorter box and builds pictures from triangles, squares and circles. Colour Mix pours two paint pots into a bowl to make a new colour, and Globe Trotter flies a little plane to continents, oceans and, at 8+, capitals and landmarks. Memory Zoo mixes animal pairs, sound pairs and remembering who hid behind the bushes.

What the games ask of your child

Reading: at 4+ none of these games need it. Picture cards, a narrator animal or an animated hand show what to do. Some content does use English words at the older tiers, such as the three-letter words in Letter Catch and Type Rocket at 6+ and the named continents and capitals in Globe Trotter at 8+.

Timing: there is no clock to beat. Letter Catch, Shape Sorter, Clock Shop, Sum Slide, Globe Trotter, Memory Zoo and Fraction Pizza have no timers, and Type Rocket has no timer while typing. Children can take as long as they need.

Mouse or touch: most tasks are a tap or a click, and some ask for a drag, such as moving number stones in Number Garden, clock hands in Clock Shop or shapes into the sorter box. On a tablet that is easy for small fingers. Type Rocket uses the real keyboard on a computer and big on-screen keys on a phone. Memory Zoo has sound pairs, so leave the sound on for that one, and Colour Mix gives every colour its own shape, so colour-blind children can play too. P pauses and M mutes.

Frequently asked questions