Today’s children are growing up with constant access to the Internet. While this is highly beneficial in many ways, it also adds a new set of challenges for parents to consider and overcome. One of these challenges is monitoring the kinds of content their children access when using search engines online.
Unfortunately, the most popular search engines like Google and Bing are not defaulted to kid-friendly settings. While they do have “safe” modes that allow for a little more parental control, they still require a bit more monitoring just to make sure the kids aren’t accessing inappropriate content.
Fortunately, there are several search engines available that are designed specifically for kids that only provide kid-friendly results. Here are a few examples of those kid-specific search engines that parents and teachers should know about.
Kiddle
Kiddle is a visual search engine for kids designed by the Google team, giving kids access to all of Google’s resources but with all of the safe search filters automatically built in.
Beyond providing its standard web and image search functionality, children can also use the “Kimages” feature, or images that are popular for kids, as well as the “Kpedia,” a children’s Wikipedia. The engine also includes video search, news search and some resources for teachers and parents.
KidRex
KidRex is a cute search engine also powered by Google, but is its own independent organization with the slogan “safe search for kids, by kids.” The home page features a picture of a T-Rex that was very likely drawn by a young child—the kind of marker-drawn piece of art that hangs on refrigerator doors across the nation.
The organization was founded in 2016, and like Kiddle addresses just about all of the most common concerns associated with children performing their own web searches.
Wacky Safe
Wacky Safe is Microsoft’s kid-friendly search engine, and is an app designed for Android phones and PCs. Its purpose is to establish an “ultra-safe” environment for searching, so parents and teachers don’t have to worry about the kinds of results their kids are pulling up from web searches. It blocks all inappropriate content and has very strict keyword filtering functionality. It also has specific website blocks that would usually be implemented in parental controls.
Check out these search engines for yourself to see how they operate and if you think they’ll be right for your home or school!