Sight Words & Spelling with Pixopop HD

Weekly spelling tests are as much an elementary school staple as Heads Up Seven-Up and story time; give little learners a jumpstart on sight words with this app.

Sight Words & Spelling with Pixopop does a good job of creating engaging challenges with kids’ word lists—particularly useful for new readers who are increasing sight word vocabulary. While there’s a lot of setup required to customize the features, it’s worth it; kids learn without realizing it as they punch in and record each word, reinforcing the letters with both audio and visuals. Word lists are totally customizable, so long as you’re working with the English alphabet—foreign letters aren’t supported. When a little speller struggles, a word can be added to the Tricky Words list for additional practice. Sight Words has three different features—spelling, featuring word lists; flashcards for self-testing and word challenge, in which budding writers must select the correct word from a group of four words that all start with the same letter.

Anime-style graphics—featuring the adorable Stitch Bunny and friends—will appeal to a wide range of youngsters, encouraging them to continue honing word association, spelling, phonics and typing skills using a built-in qwerty keyboard.