Kids Map

How it works

• Zoom decides what a tap means. With the whole world on screen, tapping names the continent. Closer in it names the country. Closer still, the state or county. A child changes what they're learning by pinching, not by finding a menu.
• Tap Kenya at world zoom and the whole of Africa lights up at once while the app says "Africa".
• The name is shown as it's spoken, in very large type and a typeface made for children learning to read, beside the country's flag. Tap the name to hear a little more: "Kenya is a country in Africa."
• Oceans, seas and lakes are named too — at world zoom the sea answers with its ocean, the counterpart of a continent.
• A find-it game. The app asks for a place on the screen and the child taps to find it. A wrong tap says what they did hit, so a miss teaches another name. After a couple of misses it gives a clue, and then the answer starts to shine.
• The map goes all the way round — drag past the Pacific and you're in Asia.

What's on the map

• Every country, and the continent it belongs to.
• England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
• States, provinces and counties for the United States, Canada, Australia, Brazil, India, Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina — Croatian, Serbian and Brazilian names read by a local voice where the phone has one.
• All five oceans and the major seas.
• The sixty largest lakes, plus Geneva, Balaton, Skadar and Chad.

Installing

1. Tap Download for Android on your phone.
2. Open the downloaded kidsmap.apk.
3. If prompted, allow your browser to install unknown apps, then tap Install.
4. Open it and hand the phone over.

No scores, and nothing to protect

• No streaks, stars, timers or progress bars. The app remembers nothing between sessions.
• No accounts, no ads, no analytics. Nothing leaves the phone.
• The whole map is inside the app — it works with no connection at all, which is rather the point on a long journey.