Tablet for a 3 year old for Xmas

System

ok, instead of a "tablet for a 3-yr old !!!!!!?!" reply...

Op, what does the 3 year old do with the ipad (apart from lobbing it down the stairs)?
what do you need the tablet to do, which app etc are needed?
tbh I struggle to imagine what a 3yr old would do with an ipad, could you not just supervise them using it instead of buying them one of their own?
I assume that it's not something they would be using for prolonged periods given any 3yr olds i know attention spans (and the old issues with kids eyesights and screens)

natalie1974

Appreciate all replies

My son does play with pencils,pens,crayons and paints etc at home and at his nursery he attends 3 full days a week .

He plays most games installed on my iPad ranging from simple Thomas the Tank colouring in to Grand Theft Auto , he likes driving the cars about , other racing games , memory games (pairs etc) and also a few simple Maths apps and cooking apps like cupcake maker etc , all simple stuff he can do .

My iPad being 3 years old now has a battery life of about 1 hour so once he has played on it I am stuck to be hooked up to a charger when I want to go on it to do anything .

My iPad has a case on it but when he launched it down the stairs it didn't and it only survived as it was an original iPad , had it been a 2/3 gen it would have smashed for sure !

I only thought about a tablet for him so he would have something to play on of his own and not constantly taking mine .

CoolHotCold

Natalie1974


How about buying yourself a shiny new tablet and gifting your old one to him.

Of course money woes and stuff like that. But sometimes you just have to splash out and cut out that cup of coffee a day you get on your way to work that costs £2.

shirlgirl2004

We have a couple of Cambridge Sciences tablets from Amazon and they are perfect to give to children. My children are a bit older and would never throw one but they have been accidentally dropped etc and are still fine.

Forwandert

natalie1974 wrote: »

Appreciate all replies

My son does play with pencils,pens,crayons and paints etc at home and at his nursery he attends 3 full days a week .

He plays most games installed on my iPad ranging from simple Thomas the Tank colouring in to Grand Theft Auto , he likes driving the cars about , other racing games , memory games (pairs etc) and also a few simple Maths apps and cooking apps like cupcake maker etc , all simple stuff he can do .

My iPad being 3 years old now has a battery life of about 1 hour so once he has played on it I am stuck to be hooked up to a charger when I want to go on it to do anything .

My iPad has a case on it but when he launched it down the stairs it didn't and it only survived as it was an original iPad , had it been a 2/3 gen it would have smashed for sure !

I only thought about a tablet for him so he would have something to play on of his own and not constantly taking mine .

I've purchased two nexus 7's recently for my 4 and 5 year olds. They are always borrowing my phone or galaxy tab and for the price they seem the best value in comparison to other branded tablets. The 'cheaper' options after a few minutes of using them don't seem very smooth to use although this maybe because I'm used to the faster newer android operating systems, some also don't have the android market for apps so you really need to look into what you are buying.

A three year old shouldn't be playing grand theft auto 3 though (it's an 18 cert as a game) I have the game on my phone and tablet but its password protected with other apps/games I don't want them to play. If they like driving around fair enough but to drive around you have to steal the car by dragging the owner out.

T_T_2

There seems to be a surge in threads of this nature recently, although so far as I can remember 3 years old is the youngest I've seen. I don't mean to give parenting advice, but if you don't want him chucking your ipad down the stairs, can you not simply tell him 'no' and don't let him play with it?

VoucherMan

T_T wrote: »

There seems to be a surge in threads of this nature recently, although so far as I can remember 3 years old is the youngest I've seen. I don't mean to give parenting advice, but if you don't want him chucking your ipad down the stairs, can you not simply tell him 'no' and don't let him play with it?

If the Mail is to be believed there may be many more threads to come.http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2222197/Surfing-net-aged-just-hi-tech-toddlers-Half-year-olds-technology-savvy.html

smithers1981

i have a 3 year old daughter and was tempted to get her an android tablet, she loves playing on mine and OH smartphones, have instead bought an innotab 2 think its more sturdy and at 3 years old she not quite old enough to fully benefit from a grown up tablet.

I think it's amazing the technology available to young kids nowadays, and this technology should be embraced, yes books and crayons have their place but come on it's 2012 in my opinion a TABLET is probably THE most educational thing you could buy a young child.

Gordon_Hose

debitcardmayhem wrote: »

What's wrong with books, crayons, educational toys especially one's that encourage the kid's imagination. Put your iPad in the drawer, read to him, draw with him, make things with him and play with him. As for a tablet I would suggest a junior aspririn for when he drops himself down the stairs. I'm with macman the world is going mad.

Because its not the 1960's anymore.

You can draw, read and educate kids on tablets nowadays.

macman

Gordon_Hose wrote: »

Because its not the 1960's anymore.

You can draw, read and educate kids on tablets nowadays.

Agreed, but not if the child in question is still at the stage of chucking toys down the stairs. Less about age than maturity.