Should You Get a Small Digital Camera For Your Kids?

Sure, special “kid’s” digital cameras exist, but these are often huge, clunky, childish-looking devices aimed at pre-schoolers. Your elementary or middle school student may not be ready for a mini digital camera that’s worth hundreds of dollars, but it’s reasonable to get them an inexpensive, compact digital camera to carry around with them.

Most cameras in this size and price range are very easy to operate – because of their small size and limited funds, they just can’t offer that many options,  so they are very easy to get used to. Most do not have zoom options, and only a few have flash, so good-quality pictures are only going to be possible at a medium distance and bright to mediocre lighting conditions.

They usually also have slow shutter speeds, so you will need to teach the child to hold the camera as still as possible for a few seconds longer than they may have seen you or someone else do on other cameras. Along those same lines, motion shots will also come out very blurry, but the kids may like that particular effect.

Most small digital cameras come with a USB cord and a CD-loaded application to quickly transfer the pictures onto your computer. These programs often are only designed for Windows, so Mac users may be on their own in loading their pictures onto their laptop or desktop computer.

To make things even easier for their users (especially children!) almost all mini digital cameras use batteries, not wall chargers, so there’s no need to remember to charge the camera. To conserve battery life, most cameras will often turn off after a short period of inactivity, so kids can’t run down the battery by forgetting to shut it off.

Pictures will have a fairly small maximum size, usually the equivalent size of a 4 x 6 film photo – though kids shouldn’t need huge pictures for anything.

Many of the newer compact digital camera models come with video options, too, though you should only expect to record short clips, because videos take up memory space much more quickly than photographs. Nevertheless, it’s nice to have the option to make mini-movies. The videos can then be uploaded to your computer and sent over the Internet just like you would with pictures.

So, overall, small digital cameras are often a good compromise for kids aged 7 to 12. The children can get almost all the features of a normal digital camera while often costing less than $50.