My son will be 6 in December and I talked with both my parents about getting my son a laptop for his birthday or christmas this year. He is in Kindergarten now and is on the computers everyday at school so I thought it would be good for him to have one at home to for school purposes only-NO INTERNET..he is much to young for that in my opinion. I was going to buy him some educational computer games-sight words,reading, that sort of thing..I also talked about it to a few other people and they said it was a bad idea because he will only be 6 and he could mess it up, break it, etc.. anyone have a kid with their OWN computer/laptop?
I am about to start college on September 27th..so Ive decided to get a "family" computer. Not sure if I want a desktop cause the lack of room in our house I kinda want a laptop cause I can take it on the go..If im visiting family.. leaning more towards a desktop computer. Thanks for all responses.. (BTW) the leapfrog computers are okay but its very limited..I want to be able to buy programs like..sight words, reading, etc.. also his computer time will be limited to 30 a day and he can only play educational games!!!
My ten year old and my six year old have the children's learning laptops from leapfrog. They do all the educational things you are wanting, and, they look just like real laptops. My oldest's has cartridges that she can change for different topics and levels to be more challenging. I think this is a cheaper, more reasonable option for his age and what you are wanting to achieve. :)
DO Not buy him his own laptop.
Our kids use a hand me down laptop that's about 7 yrs old almost. They can't really mess up a 7 yr old laptop. one wrong click and you've turned a 300 laptop into a paper weight.
Get him a Leapster 2 or a leapster explorer.
Check them out on the leapfrog website and at walmart , they have the two side by side for demo, at least ours does.
My son did a part day pre k like program last year and they used computers for educational games. He starts pre K today and they will use computers too but he never asks to use ours at home. If he did, once in a while would be fine with my supervision but I wouldn't buy him is own lap top. Kids are too plugged in now days and I don't think the schools help with that either. My daughter just started 5th grade and I asked her teacher about spelling words since she hadn't brought any home and I was told no spelling words because there is spell check! WTH!! Just because there is spell check doesn't mean my child still doesn't need to learn how to spell is what I told her. And this nonchalant attitude towards electronics and children has got to stop otherwise if it isn't on the tv, nintendo, playstation, or computer kids aren't going to know how to learn by simply exploring their own world around them with their own two hands.
Just my 2 cents, but no, your son doesn't need a lap top or anything else of that nature unless it is a Lmax from Leapfrog.
Good luck
S.
Our daughter has her own iMac. She is starting Kindergarten this year. Although it is capable of getting on the internet, she mainly uses it to watch movies (we don't have a DVD player or a tv) or to play educational games. We have had it since she was 3... The keyboard is wireless and it is such a simple simple desktop computer and I would HIGHLY recommend an iMac (hers is small and doesn't take up much space at all, and is in our living room, so we can always see/know what she is up to), you just can't break the thing. We have not had any issues at all. I do think a desktop would be a better idea than a laptop though, much less to go wrong/break.
I agree with Mommy L and Beth. My son and daughter, when they were 7 year old, had a Leapfrog computer. They enjoyed it very much and learned very much from it.
We're a pretty tech-savvy family and our son was playing on the computer by age 6. I'd recommend getting him a used one since it doesn't need to be fancy. The new mini laptops are affordable as well but still $300+ and you could probably get a used one for half that. Second I would recommend creating his own login and making it a read-only account so that he cannot accidentally remove, add, or modify anything. You would logon with an admin account to load programs or whatever but put a password on it and tell him only to logon with his account.
