30+ Holiday Apps for Creativity & Learning

Part of the Cool Sites series

Recently, I presented a webinar with Simple K12, Holiday Apps for Creating Gifts. Children, adolescents, and teens can create very meaningful gifts for friends and family members using several fun apps. The apps are very easy to use, often free, and have various multimedia options. Many integrate images, audio, text, video and extras. Moreover, students write, read, and present digital stories that tie into their real world experience! Children can also easily send the messages, videos, and cards Christmas morning for parents to wake up and see on their phones. Many of these apps have the ability for users to share their productions through online communities, e-mail, Facebook, and Twitter! Some even allow editing online on a website and embedding options.

The Presentation Slides

Holiday Video Creation Apps

These are some of the great video apps that are especially geared with Christmas and Hanukkah backgrounds and extras!

• Flixlab (I-friendly)- Great way to create collaborative holiday videos!
• Holiday Video by Vlix (I-friendly)- so many cool effects and options.
• Animoto– Upload up to 10 images, choose a soundtrack from the library (many nice holiday tunes to choose from, and click a button to make a 30-second video. Sync your videos with your Animoto.com account, download videos for offline viewing, and make longer ones with an All-Access Pass.
• Talking Santa (Android/I-friendly)- search on the app market for your phone’s free version; mimics your voice in the form of a Gremlin
• Talking Gremlin (I-friendly)- free for a limited time; mimics your voice in the form of a Gremlin
• Talking Gingerbread Man (I-friendly) mimics your voice in the form of a Ginderbread
• Wishstix (I-friendly)- record a video of you as an elf telling Santa what you want for Christmas and email to friends.
• StoryRobe (I-friendly)- It’s incredibly easy for children to adults to create audio/visual stories on the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Use the built in microphone, or any 3rd party microphone to create audio recordings with photos and videos. You have the option to upload to Youtube or send it through e-mail. You don’t need an Internet connection to create the stories, but you do to send them!
• Super Dance Elf Christmas with Friends ($0.99; I-friendly)

• RedStamp (I-friendly)
• Holiday Cards by Sincerely (Android/I-friendly)
• A Card for That (Android)
• Fotobabble– Quickly create and easily share talking photos in 3 steps (Snap or select or a photo, speak into the microphone to record audio, share with friends via email, Facebook or Twitter). You do get various holiday themed backgrounds. Example– Here’s Rosco, my pug’s holiday card to you!

Holiday Reading Apps

Inspire kids to read holiday classics with these great apps!

• MeeGenius– helps kids read (Android/I-friendly)
• Christmas Tale- Interactive ebook (Android/I-friendly)- Search for the name in your phone’s app store for the free version
• Santa’s Village– Interactive games/reading (Android)
• Tales2Go– Audio Stories (free for 30 days; I-friendly)

Holiday Music Creation Apps

Create holiday music or send a singing carol with these great apps!

• Autotune Xmas (I-friendly)
• A Holiday Piano Book: Jingle Bells by StoryBoy (I-friendly)
• Maxi’s Holiday Piano (I-friendly)
• Piano Mi (I-friendly)
• Christmas Piano (Android/I-friendly)- search in your app store for the free version
• My Baby Piano (Android)
• Jellybean Tunes Holiday Edition ($1.99; I-friendly)

Holiday Miscellaneous Apps

Create holiday books, write letters to Santa, and so much more!

• Santa Hat Sewing (I-friendly)- is a brand new arts and crafts app that will lead you all the way to design and sew that perfect Santa Hat for your kids. This art and craft app has been specially designed for the kids to take an active role in making a Santa hat.The Santa Hat Sewing app will teach you and show you how to make a great one. Idea– Create a Santa hat for a favorite doll or loved one with a cute title like Mrs. Claus!
• Comic Touch Lite (I-friendly)- Create a comic by adding various bubble captions to photos. The free version has the company logo. Example– Below is Rosco’s example!

Challenge:
Try these apps with your students and blog about any exciting ways you use them!

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What apps do you love using to send your friends holiday cheers?