In less than a month, kids will be pouring back into schools and learning plenty of new things. With schools becoming tech hubs, children are also getting involved with technology. If your child or students are tech oriented, then they should check out these tech tools as well as apps and podcasts.
This one may seem odd to start off with, but if your child has tech, they need a place to power it! And things like this Belkin Power Strip are perfect for tons of electronics. The best part is that it will protect your electronics from frying you since it’s a surge protector!
Speakers
Does your child like to rock out while studying? Or are you a teacher who wants the whole class to be able to hear the video lecture with ease? Well a nice Bluetooth speaker is going to come in handy. This Anker Bluetooth Speaker will have everything you need with the best quality sub $40. Bluetooth speakers are great because of their portability as well. They will fit easily in a backpack and typically have a really good battery life.
One place you might not know about is the Interesting Finds section of Amazon. It’s full of unique items and fun little knickknacks for anything you can think of. From workplace set up to sneakers to a “Big Kids” section, you’ll be able to find something that you didn’t even know you needed for the upcoming school year.
Cool Apps for Cool Kids
While physical things are nice and practical, nearly every child has a mobile device that supports apps, and why not get some that are both fun and educational?
DuoLingo
If there is any app that I love more than all my other apps, it’s DuoLingo. Learning a new language can be hard, tiresome, and boring to many children in the U.S. With DuoLingo, you can learn nearly any language your heart desires with ease and fun. DuoLingo is an addictive way to keep learning because it turns lessons into games packed full of listening, speaking, and translating. With hot streaks being tallied up and hearts measuring how close you’re getting to "game over,” it can be as thrilling as a racer or as confounding as a role playing game. Supplementing a language you are learning at school with DuoLingo is a great way to get a little extra help. Or if you want to learn High Valyrian or Klingon, you can do that too.
EasyBib
This app, as well as its physical site, was a lifesaver in high school and beyond. Bibliographies can be tough to write on their own, but a little help with any format from EasyBib makes it a whole lot easier. In automating the tedious task of note-taking, EasyBib is a major innovation in paper writing. Just fire up the app, point the camera at the book’s bar code, and you’re on your way to marking it up in more than 7,000 citation styles like ASA, AMA and more.
Here Comes the Bus
If you think “back to school” is all about children, you probably don’t know enough parents being run ragged by a household full of kids. As fun and full of memories as these months can be, stay-at-home parents are also anxiously awaiting the school bell to ring. Here Comes The Bus is a free app that many school districts are using to connect students, parents, and administrators with their GPS-equipped transport.
With arrival and departure information for various stops and schools, it’s great for checking if the bus is running late or if you’ve missed it. You can also get push notifications for schedule changes or when the ride is five minutes away from arriving. And if you have multiple children on different busses, you can track them all simultaneously — which is more than you might say about watching them in the summer.
Podcasts
If you are an auditory learner or just curious about different subjects, then podcasts could be good for you. We recommend checking out this list by Mashable for podcasts on all different subjects ranging from Math to Current Events.
These items will make going back to school a fun and easy time, and definitely help out a lot.