The problem is not the screen
The screen-time debate usually revolves around quantity: how many hours should a child be allowed? That is an incomplete question. An hour in a game where a skill is being built is not the same as an hour of endless scrolling through short clips.
The more useful question is: what is the child's mind doing during those minutes? Is he deciding, trying and correcting — or receiving and consuming? The gap between those two modes is far wider than the gap between one hour and two.
Five practical criteria
1) Does it end? A good game ends with a result, and the child then decides: do I play again or stop? A game designed never to end deliberately takes that decision away from him.
2) Is a mistake information? A game that only says "wrong" discourages. A game that says "wrong, the answer is this, and here is why" teaches. That is the essential difference.
3) Does it play without sign-up or in-app purchases? Asking a child for an email address is a problem; purchases inside the game are a bigger one. Both signal that the child is the product rather than the beneficiary.
4) Is the language sound? Many "translated" games are clumsy machine translations. A child absorbs the patterns of everything he reads, including the bad ones.
5) Can he tell you about it afterwards? Ask him: "what did you learn?" If he can answer in a sentence, something stayed. If he cannot, the time simply passed.
The right session length
Ages 4 to 6: ten to fifteen minutes a session. Ages 7 to 9: twenty to thirty minutes. Ages 10 to 13: up to forty-five minutes with a break.
And more important than the numbers: the stopping point should be agreed before starting, not announced at the end. "Two rounds and then we stop" is accepted; "turn it off now" generates a daily conflict.
One final tip that helps a great deal: sit with him for the first two rounds. Your presence turns the game from isolation into shared time, and gives you a real sense of the game before you judge it.
Frequently asked questions
Do educational games replace school?
No, and they do not claim to. Their role is to reinforce and revise in an enjoyable form, and their main effect is on motivation rather than content. A child who enjoys revising revises more, and that alone is worth having.
What is the difference between a free game and a subscription one?
Price is not a mark of quality in either direction. What matters is the business model: a free game with no ads and no in-app purchases is usually safer than a free one that lives off keeping a child in front of the screen as long as possible.
Do the games on this site need downloading?
No. Every game runs straight in the browser on phone and computer, with no download, no sign-up and no email address, and a child can share his score on WhatsApp with a single tap.