Suggest simple "gaming" website for 4 year old.

[iranu]

I was baby sitting my 4 year old niece the other day and she likes to play simple games so she switched users to her own login on the win XP pc, opened firefox and showed me a couple of sites that her folks had preset for simple games. She really liked little flash games where you get to dress up a character in different outfits etc by clicking on buttons to change the appearance or making your own pizza/hamburgers etc.

However, I was amazed at the awful content; rubbishy music, long loading times with adverts for PCs etc, stereotypical content and poor design.

She's learning to read and write and knows her numbers etc and is quite savvy with pointing and clicking and can recognise words like play and stop.

I tried to find some decent children's sites but most seem to be one big advertisement, are a bit trashy and don't seem to have much educational value.

Has anyone got any recommendations? It would be much appreciated.

Thanks

[Zak33]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/

The BBC do some good, some average but few really bad games

it's a little too young for some 4 year olds but some of it's still worthy.

click the link near the top for Games
I Can Cook is a good one. Arcade style "up and down " arrow games

Bob the Builder's BUILD zone is good too.

[iranu]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/

The BBC do some good, some average but few really bad games

it's a little too young for some 4 year olds but some of it's still worthy.

click the link near the top for Games
I Can Cook is a good one. Arcade style "up and down " arrow games

Bob the Builder's BUILD zone is good too.

Cheers Zak - I knew about cbeebies, but when I suggested it to "little miss" she seemed to not want that and my sister in law seemed to think she didn't like it. Don't know why because I thought that would be ideal and it was the first place I thought of. Who knows what goes through the minds of children.

Perhaps I should explore cbeebies a little and look at the games and then save some URLs to a memory stick. Now that's going to be a classic when someone looks over my shoulder at work (during lunch) and sees me playing kiddies games!

[Zak33]

oh.. hold up...

this is an age thing mate.. the lass doesn't want to be seen looking at a babies website.

So.....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/games/

it's the next stage up... ie the TV channel goes from CBeebies showing Waybaloo and Night Garden.. to the CBBC channel showing Sarah Jane Adventures.

[MuscleFlex]

the cbbc recommendations are good. i have a 4yr old and he likes that place since he's into the lego hero factory at the moment..

[chrestomanci]

My 4 year old is currently mad for a Wallace and Gromit physics based game:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcone/wallacea...aces-workshop/

It is actually fairly hard, so quite often dad gets asked to solve the more difficult puzzles on each level, but my son enjoys the game, and has a fair crack at solving each puzzle.

[Kustom]

Does anyone have an suggestions for racing/car/motorbike games? My 4yo son keeps going on regular gaming sites, but the stream of pop-ups and adverts the sites are riddled with make the experience very difficult for him.
Thanks

[Zak33]

sadly only a Wii wit Mario Kart does that job well :-)

Mine loves it

[pauleden]

Maybe a b it advanced for a four year old, but my daughter loves club penguin

[royi]

if your willing to pay, the best there is is "brain pop" which also has high educational values. You can get some of the content for free before deciding to spend your money on a subscription.

[squirrelz]

My 5yo son and 7yo stepdaughter like friv.com - basic flash games, but they'd play on it all day if we let them...

[Mehta23]

My Spanish teacher told me her son started going on a gaming site....

Friv? Frov..... Something like that.

I'm still partial to a bit of Mini clip or something from addicting games.com

[Gew]

Also, get some tiny software that maps joypad keys to actual keyboard keys, then you could get true gaming experience from those e.g. Flash/Java games online.

[Preacher]

Cbeebies again here. I give my 20 month old a go now and then to get him use to a mouse. Has no idea other than press the button (mac so only one), but he recognised the characters and loves it!