Stick with me for a moment while I discuss a study done by a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that measured mathematical abilities and gender inequalities. In countries, such as India, where gender equality is low, there is a low percentage of females scoring high in the International Mathematical Olympiad (an international math competition).

In the United States where gender equality is relatively high, girls score equally as well as boys on standardized math tests. However, more boys are identified as mathematically gifted than girls.  The professor that did the study said that there is a gender stereotype where parents and teachers believe boys are smarter than girls when it comes to math.

Come on folks!  That was the attitude back in the day when I was in school.  Why hasn’t it changed over the last half of a century, huh?

I think it behooves parents — and especially mothers and grandmothers — to nurture their daughters into believing they are just as mathematically capable as boys.  We should do everything in our power to make sure our daughters and granddaughters don’t grow up thinking they can’t do math.

So with that, I would like to introduce you to Grow Your Garden, an app for the iPhone and iPad, that helps children develop their math and their critical thinking skills

Grow Your Garden, by the folks at Learning Yard, is a delightful game.  The player gets watering cans to water various types of gardens – a regular home garden, a desert garden, a tropical jungle garden, and a snow garden.

There are flowers trying to grow in a pot.  The flower needs watering.  You have watering cans and a well where you can fill up your watering can.  (See the picture below.)

See how the flower pot has ‘empty’ droplets of water on them? You have to count them up and determine how much water you need.  Then, you fill the appropriate bucket at the well by dragging it to the well.  Then, you drag the bucket over to the flower pot to water the flower.  When you have correctly ‘filled’ the water requirements, the flower blooms and you go to the next flower (math problem).

When you finished watering all of the flowers on a level, a flower ‘grows’ in your garden.  (See the picture below.)  And then you advance to the next level.

If you make a mistake, a frowny cloud floats over the flower pot and zaps a couple bolts of lightening.  Then you can try once again with the math problem.

Of course as you progress, the math problems get harder. And, you have to think more about how to solve it. The snow garden, which is the last level, requires some hefty thinking skills.

Children who know how to add and subtract can easily learn how to play the game.  But children starting in the third grade might be able to complete the higher levels of the game better than younger children.

I highly recommend this game — especially if you have granddaughters.  It only costs $0.99 and it is money well spent.  Since Christmas is just around the corner, buy it for a grandchild for Christmas — assuming your grandchild’s family has an iPhone or an iPad.  Buy it for your own iPhone or iPad so that when your grandchildren come for a visit, you can share it with them and help them develop their math skills.

I give this app 5 out of 5 stars.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this application. However, it did not influence my opinion of the product.

One of the fun things that I like to do with my grandchildren is to let them play with apps on the iPad. It’s a good excuse because then I get to play with such delightful, colorful, sound-full activities. It’s also an excuse to snuggle with a grandchild. (Like I need an excuse. NOT!)

I recently got Puzzingo and have enjoyed playing it. (Grandpa says that I need to let the grandchildren take a turn playing it. Silly grandpa.)

With Puzzingo, you ‘build’ a circus by dragging and dropping items on the screen. You ‘shake’ a gaily-wrapped present. It pops and gives you the items to drag. There are jungle animals (my favorite), farm animals, ocean critters, numbers (cute candles on a birthday cake), balloons in the shape of alphabet letters, and toys.

The items are lined up on the right-hand side of the screen. You tap and drag the item to its shape on the left-hand side of the screen. When you tap on an item, it makes the appropriate sound (if it’s an animal) or says the letter or number.

After you finish dragging all of those items in that category, balloons float to the top of the screen. You tap on them to pop them. In my game playing experience (which is extremely minimal) I expected to see points racked up for the balloons I popped. It didn’t happen. Rats. (Maybe points for popping could be in the next version of the game.) It seemed to me that the balloons floated to the top too fast for young children. If grandma or grandpa helped the grandchildren, it would probably be okay.

This game has lots of kid appeal with its bright colors and attractive artwork. As you play, the game says the name of the item you drag into place and displays the word. Children visually recognize the items, learn how to say it, see the written word, and hear it spoken.

You can set the options to be for a little child or a bigger child. Little children only have to drag the shapes in close proximity to the placement on the screen. Bigger children, who obviously have better small muscle control, have to get the placement more exact. That is a nice option to have.

You can also turn the music on or off. Whew! Grandparents will appreciate that if their grandchild play the game a lot.

One concern that I had (and it’s really a small one) is that some of the letters in the letter section might be hard for a child to distinguish. Balloons form the letters making them very roundish. Because they are so round, some letters (like the H and the D) might be difficult for very young children to recognize. But if the grandchild is snuggling on grandma’s lap, grandma can certainly help the grandchild with these letters.

If I were to give this app a star rating, I would give it 4.75 out of 5 stars.

If you have an iPad and if you have grandchildren learning letters of the alphabet, their numbers, and their animals (and those are two big ifs sometimes), Puzzingo would be a great game to have. Loads of fun while learning.

I wish I had an iPad when I was a child . . .

Full disclosure: I received a promotional code so that I could download and review this application.

Ask any grandmother (who has grandchildren that live far away) how they feel about being a long distant grandma and she’ll probably wrinkle her nose, stomp her foot and say, “It stinks!”

This ‘over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house we go’ is not something that we grandmothers prefer.  We want to be able to easily drop by for a visit, scoop up those grandchickabiddies, smother them with hugs and kisses, be a grandma paparazzi, and then go on our merry way.

Long distant grandparents want their grandchildren to be able to recognize their face and voice even though miles separate them. If you have an iPhone or an iPad, then maybe, just maybe, those horrific miles might not be so bad.  The application Wee Pray – Pray With Me can make your separation easier to bear.

With Wee Pray, you create a special prayer or message by simply tapping your finger on the screen and talking.  You can send a morning or evening prayer to your grandchildren.  Or encouragement for the first day of school, an upcoming piano recital, or a soccer game.  Or a simple I-love-you-and-am-thinking-about-you message.

The program is easy to use. Watch this video that demonstrates just how easy.

What I liked about this application:

• The app requires a double tab to set up and record.  That way, little fingers won’t accidentally erase messages or make changes to the settings.
• You can take a picture of yourself (or use one from your camera’s photo library) and use it for your profile.
• There are 10 different ‘frames’ that you can use to spice up your photo.
• Each profile can record up to 4 messages.  That way, you can have 4 messages and grandpa can set up 4 messages for the grandkiddos.
• You can e-mail your message straight from the application.  You don’t have to use a different program.
• You can send your prayer or message to another Wee Pray app owner.
• You can personalize the profiles to your name instead of using the generic ‘Grandma’ or ‘Grandpa.”

Here are some different ideas of ways you could use this program:

• Sing a song and send it to your grandchild.
• Record a poem or short story.
• Do a count down to the day you will visit your grandchild.
• Have Santa or the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy or the Great Pumpkin (for Halloween) send a message to your grandchild.
• Send a message of love and encouragement if you know a grandchild is struggling with something.
• Tell jokes.
• If you will be visiting them soon, give them hints about the fun things they will get to do when you visit them (or when they visit you).
• Give them a ‘commercial’ about coming to your grandma camp activity.
• Send an invitation to come for a visit.
• Send a get well message to a sick grandchild.
• Share an experience with a grandchild — seeing a beautiful sunset, eating a special dessert, going fishing.

This is a great application for grandparents and parents who are iPhone/iPad owners.  It’s a great way to stay connected and to share your love.

Check out the Wee Pray — Pray With Me site.   It is also available for $1.99 (USD) from the Apple’s App Store.

Full disclosure: I received a promotional code so that I could download and review this application.

Okay, all of you iPhone totin’ grandmothers!  Whip out your iPhone, connect to the App Store in iTunes and download a fun lovin’ app for your grandchildren.  And that app is iCrayonMaker.

With iCrayonMaker, your grandchildren can have loads of fun drawing on your iPhone.  They can choose from four different drawing styles: crayon, chalk, glitter, and felt marker.

To select the color that you want to draw with, tap the color of the crayon that you want. (In this picture, you’ll notice that the hot pink crayon is selected because it is slightly higher than the rest of the other crayons.)

Then you tap inside the circle and start swirling your finger around.  This will fill in the circle.  When it gets to be the color that you like, tap the Crayon Draw tab at the bottom of the screen.  This will take you to a blank screen where you can start drawing.  Now, draw away!

When you want to change the color of your crayon, tap the Crayon Marker at the bottom of the screen to go back to your ‘box’ of crayons.

There is an undo feature that lets you undo your last three strokes.  (I wish it had more undo levels . . .)  There is an erase feature that erases everything on your screen so you can have a fresh start on a different drawing.  If you want to change the style of your crayon, simply tap the Change feature.

Once your grandchild has finished her drawing, you can send the picture to Facebook.  (How cool is that?)  You can e-mail it to someone through e-mail — like grandpa or your grandchild’s mother or father or sibling.

You can also save it to your phone’s camera roll.

The only drawback (to me) is that it doesn’t change orientation when I rotate my phone. I would like a horizontal screen.  Having this capability would give a wider screen to draw on.  (Maybe my fat fingers just need to go on a diet.  Hmmm, maybe?)

Here are two of my fabulous artistic renderings.  Watch out Rembrandt.  Here I come!

This fun little application will keep grandchildren — and grandma — happily and busily occupied for quite some time.

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this app for review purposes.