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Consumer Reports has no financial relationship with advertisers on this site. When it comes to streaming services, the first names that come to mind probably include Amazon Prime, HBO Now, Hulu, and Netflix. They offer hundreds of titles, including recent releases and original movies and TV series. One thing these subscription services have in common is that you have to pay—and just about all of them have been raising prices. But consumers can also stream movies free from services that are—in most cases—supported by ads. The best bets among these services include Kanopy, Pluto TV, Crackle, Tubi TV, Vudu, and Xumo. Like Netflix and...

You don’t have to be an expert to know that the best way to learn something is through play. Elementary aged kids start learning about geography and it can be a real challenge to keep them engaged. So just for fun (and education!) put away those flashcards and worksheets and try one of these five fun states and capitals games! States and Capitals Games Teaching kids to memorize all of the states in the nation along with their capital cities can be a daunting task. Kids might find the process boring, making it harder for them to learn (and even...

It’s no secret that parents are having a particularly difficult time during the Covid-19 pandemic. Social distancing means balancing remote work, household chores, child care, homeschooling and leisure activities to keep everyone happy and healthy. But while there are endless worksheets, scavenger hunts, videos and activities available for school-age kids in lockdown, parents of babies have fewer options. We scoured the internet and asked parents in several HuffPost Facebook communities for their advice for keeping babies entertained. “This has been so incredibly difficult ― nearly impossible,” HuffPost reader Carissa Meg wrote. “I have a 9 month old. Keep in mind,...

Using the time of social distancing to encourage children to revive the art of letter writing.The Postal Service and educational publisher Scholastic have again teamed up to promote letter writing as a critical English language skill for U.S. schoolchildren.Related: Pen pal tips and ideas for kidsActivities to Get Kids WritingI'm using the time of social distancing to encourage my girls to revive the art of letter writing. And I've got some help from two companies invested in writing. They are teaming up on a program called “Show Someone You Care.” This program is geared towards kids in 3rd and 4th grade, but...

Our unwelcome nationwide experiment has confirmed our suspicions: Working full-time from home while keeping young kids educated and entertained is impossible. Toddlers and preschool-age kids aren’t developmentally ready for extended solo playtime, and even if you’re not opposed to parking them in front of screens, they’ll eventually get bored. What you need is a safe, reasonably educational, and time-consuming activity that requires only half-distracted parental assistance. Believe it or not, such a thing exists: the scavenger hunt.A form of good clean fun, the scavenger hunt, like hide-and-seek, is as old as time; scavenger hunt clues give parents a chance to...