20 Educational Websites for Kids That are Free and Fun

Each of the educational shows your children watch on PBS has its own learning section through PBSKids.org. Try sing-a-long songs, sorting and counting games, watch videos, and more.

Younger children will love everything about Sesame Street’s online home. They can choose from hundreds of the show’s video clips and play games that help them learn letters, animal sounds, rhymes, colors, and more.

When a mom mentions she’s looking for some great educational websites for her kids, it’s not long before Starfall.com is mentioned. The site has been online since 2002 and works with your children through letter recognition all the way through to reading plays, nonfiction, and comics.

CoolMath calls itself “an amusement park of math and more.” Children can play online math games that help them with addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, decimals, money and more. CoolMath is geared toward ages 13 and up, but sister site CoolMath4Kids.com is appropriate for ages 3 through 12. CoolMath-Games.com includes math games for preschoolers.

A site that guarantees to make your child a genius has a lot of promises to live up to. MakeMeGenius.com is filled with videos that cover a variety of subjects, such as physics for kids, photosynthesis, the nervous system, solar system, and electricity. All of the videos are kid-friendly and will keep even your youngest children interested from start to finish.

From the publishers of TIME magazine, TIME for Kids is loaded with interesting articles, photos, and videos. Politics, the environment, entertainment, sports, and health are just some of the topics covered. TIME for Kids isn’t as interactive as most of the other website on this list of educational websites for kids, but the site does tackle subjects that are in the news now while being written for an audience of children.

Watch animal cameras, learn interesting tidbits about animals, see and share photos of nature, learn about different countries and try science experiments. These activities don’t even begin to scratch the surface of the National Geographic Kids website. There’s even a “Little Kids” section for the younger explorers in your house.

The Kidz Page has more than 5,000 pages of learning games and activities. Online coloring pages, jigsaw puzzles and word games are just a few sections of this massive site. Each holiday also has its own section of activities and games to enjoy with your children.

When your child wants to know why the sky is blue, how a tornado forms, or any number of other questions she can come up with on a daily basis, head on over to How Stuff Works. The articles break down subjects like autos, culture, entertainment, science, money, technology and more. Games, quizzes, and videos also round out your children’s learning experience.

One visit to Fun Brain and you’ll want to bookmark it for your kids. Math, reading, online books and learning games are just some of the site’s many treats. Fun Brain caters to preschoolers through 8th graders.

If you can look past the ads, you’ll find printables, games and other activities your kids will enjoy at NickJr.com. The games allow your children to explore their creativity, play dress-up, learn new music, put together puzzles and work on numbers and shape recognition.

Scholastic is one of the more unique educational websites for kids. This site, from the publishers of the educational books you find in schools, contains activities broken up by grades. Pre-K learners all the way up to seniors in high school can find learning activities geared toward them.

Fans of Mickey and friends will love visiting Disney Jr. Educational. Games, coloring pages, and videos are a few of the highlights. The games focus on memory, hand-eye coordination, color matching and other important skills for developing minds.

It’s hard to narrow the list of science websites because there are so many great resources. But San Francisco’s Exploratorium at the Palace of Fine Arts showcases a website that teaches kids about science and art in new ways. The departments let kids tinker with gadgets, go below the sea, rocket into the galaxy and also learn about the science of gardening, animals, and cells, to name a few.

Games, quizzes and fact sheets take kids on a journey through time. Kids can set off on a learning adventure when they walk through ancient history, world history and histories of specific countries on the BBC History for Kids website.

The magazine for kids that’s been around for more than 60 years now offers online ways to play, read and craft with your children. Matching games, art activities, animated stories and science experiments are just a few ways kids can learn while having fun on the Highlights for Kids website.

Why do we need trees? Are jellyfish fish? Who travels with the president? These are just a few of the facts your kids can learn on the ​Discovery Channel’s site for children. Games, puzzles, activities, and quizzes get kids involved in learning something new without it feeling like work.

Learn about animals, chemistry, spelling, geography, astronomy, and plenty of other subjects on KidsKnowIt.com. Watch free educational movies, listen to educational music and read fun facts about everything from bats to bones.

The name of the site says it all. Learning Games for Kids is all about games that teach kids almost every subject you can think of. Word, spelling, social studies, brain, science, art, vocabulary, literature and keyboarding games will get your kids started on a learning adventure.

It’s learning with a twist. The Old Farmer’s Almanac for Kids features riddles, puzzles, a question of the day, a timeline of interesting history facts, sky events and weather conditions to track at home with your children.