Kids using computers

[chai18]

What can little children do on a PC other than watch DVDs or use the internet. I'm not keen on them watching films for hours nor do I want them to get used to unsupervised internet access.

Any ideas

There are loads of good, educational websites as well as fun sites. What age are you talking about?

4 and 6

\link{http://www.poissonrouge.com/\Poisson Rouge} is a pretty good site for little ones.

\link{http://www.kershaw.dsl.pipex.com/\Here's} another.

I'm looking for non internet stuff, please

You can buy educational pc cd roms for their age group. PC world sells them.

there's alot of cbeebies stuff available which is educational and fun.

ed. thanks.

Is there anything than can be downloaded from the net?

.

shockwave.com has a load of free 1 hour trials kid games

I get Learning Land discs for my son. They are educational but really good fun. I think they were a collection some time ago, but I have built up a set for him by buying them off Ebay. I usually pay 50p-£1 +p&P for each disc or less if I buy a few.

Games that you play online are downloaded into your internet cache and can sometimes be played after you have disconnected. Also you can search directly for the game files in google. Check \link{http://www.tes.co.uk/section/staffroom/thread.aspx?story_id=2162408&path=/Primary/\here} for ideas on how to do this.
Not all games will work offline.

My six year old enjoys the zoombini games and the cluefinder series both available at amazon (and probably PC world). Both my four year old and six year olds love KidPix (try ebay). Microsoft Paint (comes free with windows) is also worth a try. Your six year old may enjoy writing in Word, inserting clipart and playing around with Word Art; a version of Word is used in most primary schools so she/he may already be familiar with it.
As for unsupervised internet access, it is possible to buy software that will restrict the sites available.
Barbara \link{http://www.kershaw.dsl.pipex.com/\Kershaw Kids}

I'd second the Learning Land CDs. My DS (3.5) is absolutely hooked on them. I don't mind him spending a bit of time on them, because he's learning so much. Since starting playing on these about 6 weeks ago he can recognise all his numbers, and lots more letters. He's often telling me about road safety and things you can find in rock pools! I've bought lots from ebay for about £1 each.

Google Earth is Fab. The boys love finding places on it