Now, Diamandis is developing an X Prize for education.

Unlike other prizes, the development of an X Prize in education has proven especially difficult. But how is it that tackling the shortcomings of our education system could be harder than sending three people into space – twice?

There are at least two potential explanations.

1. Historically, there has been a lack of R&D investment in education

Image via timatymusic on Flickr Creative Commons

The first X Prize was offered in the aviation and space exploration industry. Since the Wright Brother’s first flight in 1903, investment in the aerospace industry has been amply supported by military, government and private investment.

While the aerospace industry has been transformed by technology, the education industry has seen relatively little technological innovation. Hornbooks and chalkboards have given way to text books and smart boards, but such developments are differences of degree, not of kind. The way children learned in 1903 is largely the way children learn today.

Image via flickingerbrad on Flickr Creative Commons

Until very recently, perhaps with the introduction of Khan Academy, disruptive technological innovation had little impact on education. The good news is that the pace of innovation is accelerating.

Perhaps the biggest headline in educational technology in the past year has been Apple’s claim that it aims to “revolutionize” education by “reinventing the textbook” with its iBooks educational platform.

To put it another way: the biggest technological disruption in education of late has been the digitalizing of textbooks.

This does not strike me as a revolution in and of itself, but that is not to say that it isn’t profoundly important.

2. Reforming a system is very different than developing a new technology

Image via flickingerbrad on Flickr Creative Commons

The fact that Apple, the largest company in the world, is focusing a portion of its R&D efforts on education suggests that a new ecosystem of educational technology might be in its first evolutionary stages.

The real purpose of an X Prize is to spur investment in a particular field. The first X Prize produced over $100 million in investment. But a revolution in education won’t likely be fomented by a single prize. Perhaps the way forward can be shown by an analogy.

There is an important lesson to be learned from the most famous research and development undertaking in American history, NASA. On May 25, 1961 President Kennedy issued a challenge to a joint session of Congress: put a man on the moon by the end of the decade. It’s estimated that the “space race” led to aerospace investments totaling $400-$600 billion dollars at NASA alone. That’s 40-60 times the total investment of the first X Prize and the number grows dramatically when you consider all the private sector investment.

The impact of this level of investment is sometimes obvious (landing on the moon), but is often far more subtle and profound. The applications of technologies developed in the space race touch our lives every day.

Image via flickingerbrad on Flickr Creative Commons

In order to develop an ecosystem of investment the way NASA did in the second half of the 20th century, major institutions, both public and private, will need to make a firm commitment to the development of new technologies. And innovative individuals will need to form new ventures and keep a watchful eye for novel applications of technology to improve education.

No matter the level of financial investment, a dramatic disruption in education will require the active engagement of all stakeholders. After all, the real investment that spurred aerospace innovation was the emotional investment of the American people.

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Matthew McDonnell is currently pursuing his J.D. at the University of Texas Law School, having already earned his MBA at the College of Charleston. With a varied past as an elementary teacher, a sailing instructor, and a long time student, Matthew is now Famigo’s trusted privacy expert (and a genuinely excellent dude).

Since 1980, the number of obese children and adolescents in the U.S. has nearly tripled.  This epidemic has produced more than a few laments, but amid the chorus of voices sounding alarm a few are shouting solutions.

One such solution is Smash Your Food, a wildly entertaining, remarkably educational app designed to help you and your children eat well.  The inspiration for the app came to nutritionist Marta De Wulf when one of her obese clients asked why no one taught her basic nutrition when she was still a child.

Smash Your Food’s aim is simple: to teach the user and parent the nutritional value of the staples of children’s junk food such as cheese burgers, donuts, soda, and milkshakes in order to encourage healthier food choices.

Smash Your Food accomplishes this goal by referencing the familiar organizational structure of the USDA’s food pyramid. Many children will be able to tell you that they should eat foods that are low in oil, salt and sugar, but then in the same breath ask you to have cheeseburgers or pepperoni pizza for dinner.

Even though children know that they should eat relatively small amounts of oil, sugar and salt, they don’t necessarily understand that some of their favorite foods are loaded with them. Smash Your Food’s basic assumption is that if people actually understood what was in many of the foods they ate, they would make better decisions.

And what better way is there to find out what’s in your food than to smash it in an industrial press and see what comes out?

Like many of the best educational apps, Smash Your Food is less of a game and more of a remarkably fun science experiment.  Each user creates a profile with information relevant to their nutritional needs such as age and level of activity. Based on this information the app provides a guideline for the maximum amount of salt, sugar and oil that a child should eat in a given meal.

As the game play begins, a food is shown in the smashing machine.  The user must then make her guess about the quantity of sugar, salt and oil in the item.  Once the guesses have been made the user pulls the lever and the slow motion smash begins. Points are awarded based on the accuracy of the user’s guesses.  These points open additional levels and foods to smash including “crazy foods” such as a pile of corn dogs.

Users can’t help but want to unlock new levels and foods to smash, but in order to do so, they have no choice but to learn the basics of nutrition.

Smash Your Food offers families much more than basic nutrition education.  As each kid progresses through the game, parents receive an email, which includes genuinely useful tips such as suggestions for healthy substitutes, and advice from nutrition professionals.

The power of this app to transform the eating habits of a family consists in its ability to get families talking about nutrition. By involving the whole family in collective decisions about the foods they eat, it increases each family member’s level of accountability and leads invariably to better decisions while encouraging more interaction among family members.

Ok, so this dude might be a bit small for Smash Your Food, but he's adorable! (Image via gretchichi on Flickr Creative Commons.)

Smash Your Food also does an excellent job of encouraging additional learning beyond the app both by sparking curiosity, and through it’s Food N’ Me website which is packed with additional activities and resources for the whole family. My favorite activity was “What Recipe Are You?”, an interactive series of adventures that culminate in the discovery of a healthy, kid-friendly recipe.

You won’t get unnecessarily complex dietary information here. The information contained in Smash Your Food is simple and useful and the app itself is loads of fun.  That’s a great recipe to develop healthy eating habits in the children you hold dear.

Smash Your food is recommended for Kids, Tweens, and Teens (Ages 5 to 18) for elementary level educational concepts with comic appeal. Find screenshots, reviews and family-friendly ratings for Smash Your Food and more of the best iPad apps at Famigo.com.

Developer: Food N’ Me

Compatibility: iPad (iOS 4.3 or later)

App Category: Education

Price: $2.99

Famigo Family Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

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Matthew McDonnell is currently pursuing his J.D. at the University of Texas Law School, having already earned his MBA at the College of Charleston. With a varied past as an elementary teacher, a sailing instructor, and a long time student, Matthew is now Famigo’s trusted privacy expert (and a genuinely excellent dude).

It seems like every week there is a news story about how a child spent an inordinate amount of money on virtual goods. We’ve wrote about this issue time and time again. Families do have a reason to be wary when over 60% of the apps in Apple’s App Store are freemium based and many of the apps within Google Play are as well.

What’s freemium? A freemium app is one that is free to download, but developers make money through in-app purchasing of items, or unlocking the full version of the app.

Lots of kids are using smartphones and tablets, and there's a bunch of chances to make purchases! (Image via Monarchcreative on Flickr Creative Commons.)

The biggest problem that families have with in-app purchasing is that developers of children’s apps are using this model to make a profit from kids. Since most of the in-app purchases require no password and are simply a one-click affair, it is very easy for children to spend a ton of money without their parents ever knowing.

It has become a bit harder to make in-app purchases unknowingly since Apple has changed their policy that used to allow in-app purchases without a password for the first 15 minutes after download. This is no longer the case, but families should still keep on eye out for purchases they don’t intend to make.

Some parents are so fed up with the ease of in-app purchasing they are suing Apple for allowing developers to make games for kids that are “too addicting”.

This has clearly become an issue for families, so the Famigo team came up with -

4 Tips to Prevent Accidental In-App Purchases

1. Talk To Your Kids

No technology can replace good parenting (well until the robots take over). Sit down and talk to your kids about in-app purchasing and set up some rules. For example, they could be allowed to purchase an item or unlock one game a week.

2. Screen Apps

Take a look at what your kids download to see if there are any hidden costs. (Image via novemberwolf on Flickr Creative Commons.)

For younger kids, sitting them down and talking about money and its value is important, but it may not be as effective as it will be with older kids. Your best strategy is to screen all the apps you download for your child. This may seem like a very boring and tedious task, but it’s not because we at Famigo have done it for you! Just go to our website before downloading an app to see if it has in-app purchases.

3. Watch Your Kids Play

Passing back your phone or tablet is a great way to keep your child occupied in lines or on the car ride home, but it’s also a great way for your kid to rack up your credit card bill by accident. Just watch them play their games from time to time and you will be able to spot the in-app purchases very easily.

4. Use Famigo Sandbox

Yes, this a shameless self-promotion, but we honestly believe that the best way to keep your kid from purchasing a bunch of virtual fish is to use the Sandbox. Not only does Famigo Sandbox prevent in-app purchases but it also keeps your kid from sending your boss a potentially embarrassing email.

How do you keep your kids from making in-app purchases? We would love to hear your tips and stories! Sound off in the comments below.

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Originally from Fort Worth, TX, Yahya is currently pursing duel degrees in Marketing and Psychology at the University of Texas.  When he is not busy with the “demanding” schedule of a college student, he is constantly testing new health and psychological studies on himself in order to combat bad science. Something he feels way too strongly about. He is also your go to guy if you want to know everything and anything about Fort Worth; which we don’t but, he wont stop talking about it.

Coco Loco

Coco Loco

Who says you can’t get much for a dollar nowadays? This app is jammed packed with content. From an adorable and in-depth story line to lovably sweet characters, this game has won us over. You have to use differently powered characters to save the Marshies from their grim fate forced upon them by evil coco beans. Who wouldn’t love this app?

Open Sea!

Open Sea!

Help part the seas! This oddly engaging game tasks you with helping Mo and his people cross the ocean to avoid an oncoming mummy horde. The graphics are fantastic, the instructions are super clear, and the game offers challenges that are doable by young and old players alike.

Oven Break

Oven Break

Escape your sweet end as a gingerbread man by running, jumping, and sliding! This simple side scroller game is packed full of sweet fun. The premise is super cute, the graphics are awesome and the challenge level is just high enough to keep older players interested and younger players not frustrated. The music is cute and the game is over all highly addictive.

Word Mess

Word Mess

This app had us hooked for much, much longer than it took to write a review, and we expect to be playing it for a long time to come. If you’re wondering how fun a word search can be, Word Mess will prove to you that there’s something addictive and highly entertaining about finding words amongst a colorful set of jumbled phrases. Paired with the upbeat music to keep you focused, this app is a winner in our hearts.

Dr. Panda, Teach Me! Preschool

Dr. Panda

Dr. Panda can indeed teach you a ton! From numbers, to animals, to shapes, this app is loaded with fun mini-games and a lot to learn. Additionally, the illustrations are very cute and clean.

Famigo would like to thank all of these fantastic developers for pouring a ton of time, energy, passion, and effort into creating truly standapart apps that we thoroughly enjoyed reviewing. This is the reason we do what we do! To find the great content for families that might otherwise get lost in the sea of the marketplaces.

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To learn more about the Famigo APProved program, visit our About section and click on the Developer’s tab. (edit)

Mother’s Day is coming

It’s always the 2^nd Sunday in May and yet every year it sneaks up on me! During the month of May my family of 3 kids has no less than 2,000 different events going on! (Okay so it FEELS like 2,000.)

But seriously with Little League ramping up, band concerts, awards banquets and all sorts of other end of the school year events going on, our weeknight calendar is crazy PACKED.

Mother’s Day often feels like just more ‘stress’ for a lot of busy moms.

Now think about the mother who is doing all of what I just described… on her own. A single mom you might know or a military wife on her own during her husband’s deployment or maybe just a mom who has had a rotten year financially or otherwise?

Our friends at Cozi.com  (the people who created that fab calendar mobile app for busy families!) have created a whole campaign asking you to look around and find a way to be a ‘secret ninja mom’ and share with ‘Another Mother’ on Mother’s Day.

They’re calling it: Make Another Mother’s Day (#MAMD for short and cute)

“If you know someone who works hard to do best by her kids and family but maybe doesn’t have someone to tell her how much her hard work is appreciated, here’s your chance to Make Another Mother’s Day:

Do it secretly (awesome!) or in person (still fab!), but the key is to do something, big or small, for another mother this Mother’s Day.

If you need gift ideas, here’s a list of items that moms told us they love.”
—Cozi Team

I’m already planning my secret-ninja-mom-doorbell-ditching escapade. Shhhhhh!!

Now I feel the need to share a list of fun mom apps I’ve been saving to share with the Famigo crowd for Mother’s Day. Consider it MY secret ninja gift to YOU!

Mom Needs That!
5 Apps Mom’s Will Love

AllRecipes Dinner Spinner
Apple/Android FREE (Pro=$2.99)

NOTE: upgrade to the original app is out!  Now in addition to finding fabulous recipes with the app (AllRecipes.com is my absolute favorite ON-line recipe helper) they have added a barcode scanner to the app. While in the store scan a barcode of an avocado and see recipes for guacamole! Before you leave home scan an empty carton of greek yogurt and add it to your grocery list. And as always ‘Let the Spinner Choose!’ As a mom sometimes deciding what to make for dinner is harder than MAKING dinner. Enter Tortillas and Sour Cream and see what magic the Spinner comes up with.

 Stuff Mom Never Told You (Podcasts)
Android/Apple: FREE

From HowStuffWorks.com, I love the women-centered facts and stories in these podcasts. My favorite recent podcasts are about the first woman who ran in the Boston Marathon (1972! Crazy!) and judging a book by its cover… talking about how your Facebook profile is currently your first impression.

WHITE

DealBoard
Apple: FREE (Android soon)

Daily Deals/Shopping Anyone?
I’ve been testing this app out on my iPad (which doesn’t make a lot of sense since it’s better to have it on a phone and mobile network). But anyway, you use it to corral all the ‘daily deals’ clogging up your inbox. Let the app find the best deals near your location and if you see one you need NOW, simply click it and if you already have an account with that deal site, log in and buy. If you don’t, create and account and done ‘deal’.  Over all the app gets a ‘B’ from me, but really the app works fine, it’s just that I live in a small community so very little ‘deals’ are near me, I’d love if it could find online ‘national’ deals, eh?

Martha’s EveryDay Food App
Apple: 99 cents

I once received a subscription to this popular food magazine for a year, and I loved it! My kids still thumb through the now dog-eared pages looking for ideas. And I was happy to see they have made an app for it! However, I didn’t download this yet, honestly can they please bring it to Android? I would totally pay for this on my phone! iPhone peeps, enjoy.

WebMD Mobile
Apple/Android: FREE

I am completely intrigued by this app. I know you know those neurotic moments where you are freaked out by a child’s bump or rash and can’t decide if it means a trip to the doctor or simply an ice pack? Type in the symptoms and see what WebMD suggests! I’m sure you wouldn’t substitute a Doctor’s advice for this app though, right?

And of course, you should test out the Cozi app for your family’s sanity!
Free on both Android and Apple.

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In a former life Carissa Rogers was a molecular biologist. In her current life she is the chief researcher of blogging karma, parenting dos (and some don’ts) and for spice she pretends to be a photographer…a mom of all trades. Carissa is passionate about technology for kids and she is a Famigo Parent Adviser and monthly blog contributor. You’ll catch her writing all her goodncrazy thoughts on her blog: GoodNCrazy.com. She has three good kids and one crazy husband. Connect with her on Twitter: @CarissaRogers

I found the transition to be impressive, so I ended up marrying that drummer. Ha! Okay, that’s not why, but I did end up marrying him and spent the majority of the first year of our marriage getting motion sick on a tour bus. So fun!

"Mom, can we ditch these blocks and hit the piano, instead? I've been really liking Frederic Chopin lately, so we'd like to try our hand at a sonata in B-flat minor. Also? Could you bring us some cookies?"

Now Jack and I are three kids deep and it has become very obvious that our home is a musical one. Our basement houses enough instruments and equipment to rival our local Guitar Center (I lay claim to a bass guitar and a cello stand, but no cello, nor do I play cello… in case you were wondering), and our two elder daughters will break out in song and dance with the frequency of an episode of Glee.

At three weeks, two years, and three and a half, our girls can’t yet wield an instrument, but aside from our usual car radio sing-a-longs and renditions of the Itsy Bitsy Spider, we found a really fun app that encourages my family’s love of all things musical.

Jack downloaded ThumbJam onto his iPad. ThumbJam is self-described as a “powerful music experience… of over 40 high quality real instruments.”

We can pick an instrument – say, flute or cello or electric guitar – and Jack picks the scale. So Jack can sit in the living room and start playing a song on his guitar in E major. He’ll cue everything up on ThumbJam and hand the iPad off to our 3 year old, Remmy. Using her hand to play different notes, suddenly Jack and Remmy are playing music. Together! And it sounds fantastic!

Jack is playing “Blackbird” on guitar, and Remmy is playing the violin – notes in the same scale. And both are singing and it’s harmonious and just a really fun experience for both of them. Remmy can even wiggle her index finger and give that violin some vibrato.

So if you or someone in your house is a musician and you feel like getting your America’s Got Talent on with your tot, totally check out ThumbJam. It’s just another fun way to encourage musical exploration. Personally, I’d like to get my two year old to rap with me, Kanye + Jay-Z style, but Jack gave that idea the thumbs down.

Tsk.

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Roo Ciambriello is a freelance writer living in a beach town in Connecticut with her musician husband and her three little girls.  She writes a fun humor blog, NiceGirlNotes, knits to relax, and likes her lemonade over lots of ice.  You can follow Roo on Twitter or say hi on Facebook.  She likes new friends.  Especially new friends that know how to get rid of the rabid raccoon stalking her deck at night.