Guest Post: LeapPad Learning Tablet Review

Today I have my pal, Willie from RGDDesigns here to kick some knowledge about some learning tablets he played with reviewed for his nephews. Willie is a pleasant mixture of humor, brawn, sensitivity and awesome. He’s a smarty pants brilliant, Android-carrying, video game loving, tech savvy dude and I hope you’ll enjoy what he has to share with us today. Also? He just got engaged to an awesome chica so please show him some comment love!

Earlier this month, I got to spend some hands-on time with the LeapPad Explorer Learning Tablet, by LeapFrog.

This is a great little device for kids who always want to get their hands on mommy or daddy’s grown-up tablet.  It has 5 inch resistive touch screen which isn’t as responsive as capacitive touch screens like those found on most modern touch screen devices, iPhones, iPads, etc. That’s a good thing when you have a little one who might not understand that a capacitive touch screen doesn’t know the difference between a finger and a palm.  There’s also a camera built into the back of the tablet that integrates into some of the apps available such as letting your kids doodle onto pictures they take.

Speaking of apps, there are apps that can be downloaded onto the device through an app center that must be installed onto your Mac or PC.  Unfortunately, there’s no WiFi built into this lil tablet so you’ll have to hook it up to your machine to download the apps onto the device itself.  The device also supports cartridge based games from the Leapster Explorer.

Leapster Explorer.

This is nice if you’ve already invested in a library of those games as I know some parents have already.  The LeapPad also has a directional circle pad and buttons built into the front so that the cartridge based games that weren’t built with a touch screen in mind can be controlled with ease.

Other methods of control are either via the touchscreen and included stylus, through a built in tilt sensor, or a combination of all of the control methods.  With this many control options, it will be interesting to see what kinds of apps developers come up with to keep the attention of your little ones, while hopefully teaching them a thing or two.

The LeapPad’s flexible control options mean this device has the potential to grow with your child as their mental and physical capacity develops over time.  The bulky construction and hard plastics used will also ensure that this device will survive a beating or two.  When keeping all that in mind, the $99.00 price tag starts to feel a little less painful, this is a device that will be with your kids for years to come.

If you still want to get a tablet for your kids that has a more robust operating system such as Android or iOS, you might want to read my blog post on, RGDDesigns on what happened when my nephews got an Android tablet. Until next time, happy learning!

{Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links, and all opinions here are Willie’s.}

Isn’t Willie awesome? Be sure to like RGD Designs on Facebook and stop by his blog for more details on the LeapPad Learning Tablets review.

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Tagged as: leap pad, tablets