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Posts Tagged ‘Early Reading’

Leapster Arcade Letterpillar

January 7th, 2010

Leapster Arcade Letterpillar




This hungry Letterpillar loves to eat letters. Watch him grow as he munches his way through a lively arcade game that reinforces important early reading and spelling skills. Teaches phonics, uppercase and lowercase letters and word building. For use with the Leapster Learning System or Leapster L-Max Learning Game System, each sold separately.

User Ratings and Reviews

4 Stars Great Beginner Game
My son received the Leapster system for his 4th birthday as a gift. It comes with this game. While this game isn’t the most challenging, my son enjoys it. I am not sure at what level the previous reviewers children are at, but my son doing very well at school. Maybe they are academically beyond him. He knows all of his letters, their sounds, and can read three letter words. He can also write out all of the letters in the alphabet, uppper and lower. So while this game isn’t extremely challenging, he still found it fun. I haven’t found controlling the letterpillar to be difficult at all, as a previous reviewer said. The arrow buttons on the control respond fine when controlling the letterpillar. I think this game was great as a “free” game with the system, because it allowed him to get used to using the controller. And my son isn’t electronically deprived. He uses our personal computer all of the time to play games. He also has a V-Smile with other games. We wanted this as a portable gaming system. Again, it was a good first, free game. I have nothing bad to say about it considering I didn’t have to pay for it.

5 Stars Great letter review!
Found the letterpillar a fine afternoon rainy day breath of fresh air for my girls. Like that the letterpillar gets ill if it eats numbers. :)

2 Stars It’s educational
We bought cartridge for our 3 year old. We were going on a airplane trip and thought it would keep his attention. He used it for only 5 minutes and wanted the creature creation cartridge. He may get more into this one when he gets older.

2 Stars Letterpillar – doesn’t stack up to other Leapster games
While my 3 yr old and 5 yr old play this game some, it doesn’t compare to the other cartridges we own. There is only one game on the cartridge. It is simple, and I’m not convinced it has much educational value, as do most of the other Leapster games we have. I recommend you buy the Draw & Write or the Letter Factory. My children fight / “take turns” over those two games and they are educational.

5 Stars Great letter teacher, phonics, etc. lots of fun
My grand daughter loves this and Running on Zero, one for letter skills, the other for math. Both are fun, and teach the child. They challenge your child to try harder, for a better score, even though there’s no grading involved (the way it should be)

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Leapster Arcade Letterpillar

November 23rd, 2009

Leapster Arcade Letterpillar




This hungry Letterpillar loves to eat letters. Watch him grow as he munches his way through a lively arcade game that reinforces important early reading and spelling skills. Teaches phonics, uppercase and lowercase letters and word building. For use with the Leapster Learning System or Leapster L-Max Learning Game System, each sold separately.

User Ratings and Reviews

4 Stars Great Beginner Game
My son received the Leapster system for his 4th birthday as a gift. It comes with this game. While this game isn’t the most challenging, my son enjoys it. I am not sure at what level the previous reviewers children are at, but my son doing very well at school. Maybe they are academically beyond him. He knows all of his letters, their sounds, and can read three letter words. He can also write out all of the letters in the alphabet, uppper and lower. So while this game isn’t extremely challenging, he still found it fun. I haven’t found controlling the letterpillar to be difficult at all, as a previous reviewer said. The arrow buttons on the control respond fine when controlling the letterpillar. I think this game was great as a “free” game with the system, because it allowed him to get used to using the controller. And my son isn’t electronically deprived. He uses our personal computer all of the time to play games. He also has a V-Smile with other games. We wanted this as a portable gaming system. Again, it was a good first, free game. I have nothing bad to say about it considering I didn’t have to pay for it.

5 Stars Great letter teacher, phonics, etc. lots of fun
My grand daughter loves this and Running on Zero, one for letter skills, the other for math. Both are fun, and teach the child. They challenge your child to try harder, for a better score, even though there’s no grading involved (the way it should be)

5 Stars Great letter review!
Found the letterpillar a fine afternoon rainy day breath of fresh air for my girls. Like that the letterpillar gets ill if it eats numbers. :)

2 Stars Letterpillar – doesn’t stack up to other Leapster games
While my 3 yr old and 5 yr old play this game some, it doesn’t compare to the other cartridges we own. There is only one game on the cartridge. It is simple, and I’m not convinced it has much educational value, as do most of the other Leapster games we have. I recommend you buy the Draw & Write or the Letter Factory. My children fight / “take turns” over those two games and they are educational.

2 Stars It’s educational
We bought cartridge for our 3 year old. We were going on a airplane trip and thought it would keep his attention. He used it for only 5 minutes and wanted the creature creation cartridge. He may get more into this one when he gets older.

Buy/More Info

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LeapFrog ClickStart Educational Software Finding Nemo Sea of Keys

April 24th, 2009

LeapFrog ClickStart Educational Software Finding Nemo Sea of Keys




Finding Nemo: Sea of Keys proves there’s nothing fishy about underwater learning fun. Kids join Dory, Nemo and their friends in deep-sea adventures designed to buoy mastery of letters, phonics skills and word building. Dive into games that help kids build early reading and keyboard skills. For use with the ClickStart My First Computer (sold separately).

User Ratings and Reviews

2 Stars Better Choices Out There
My son loves his ClickStart, which we started with The Thomas the Tank Engine and Dora programs. We added Diego and Nemo after we saw that he liked it. Of all the titles I would say this one is the most lame.

To start, the characters don’t look all that much like they do in the movie and of course the voices are not the same – this was a little distracting. But the big issue is that the games themselves are not very good. The objectives are unclear and the feedback lacking. In contrast the Dora and especially Deigo games are engaging, challenging and well-paced.

The more your little one likes Nemo the less they’ll like this game.

5 Stars great educational product!
We purchased this for our three year old son and he absolutely loves it! Although there are only three to four different games on this cartridge – he asks to play it frequently. The games reinforces keyboarding skills, using the mouse, following instructions, letter and number recognition, and colors. Great game!

5 Stars My three year old loves it!
My three year old really loves to play the Nemo game. He doesn’t nap anymore so it is a nice activity to do during his rest time after lunch, instead of watching tv. We are so glad we got it!

5 Stars Finding Nemo
This is fabulous. My kids love it and it’s very educational and they fight over who’s going to play with it. We only have one keyboard for the 4 of them. I would highly recommend this and hopefully the cartridges could be expanded to more difficult levels.

4 Stars fun and educational
My 3-year old received this game for Christmas and loves it. He asks to play it daily and has had much more success with it than the games that came pre-loaded on the ClickStart.

The first game, Shark Hunt, shows a keyboard displayed on the screen. For level 1, a little fish “hides” behind one of the letters. When you click on the right letter you find the fish and earn a star. If you click on the wrong letter, a picture of something that starts with that letter appears and it makes the appropriate sound. My son likes this almost as much as finding the fish, which he is a whiz at now but still enjoys. Level 2 is similar but you spell out 3-letter words in order to find the fish.

The next game has Nemo popping the bubbles that fill the screen in order to reach the top. On level 1 the bubbles are color-coded according to the keys on the keyboard (click a blue key to pop a blue bubble, etc.). My son doesn’t like this one too much. On level 2 the bubble have specific letters or numbers to push to pop the bubbles. He likes this one a little better, but still not his favorite.

The third game has a little turtle swimming through the water. You press the up and down arrows or use the mouse to move the turtle up and down to catch a particular shape that the game directs you to look for. My son likes this game pretty well; we haven’t attempted level 2 on it yet though.

Overall I think this is a good product, though not a particularly great value at $20. I am very pleased that my son is now very familiar with where the letters are on the keyboard and is starting to spell 3-letter words, thanks in part to this game.

Buy/More Info

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