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Learning Software for Toddlers?
dunkan asks: "I know there are a lot of different software packages out there available for children. But I have an 19 month old boy who loves to move the mouse, and press buttons. While he can randomly start winamp and skip through the playlist, he doesn't know what he is doing.
Does anyone have software suggestions for children in this age group? I would think it would be a simple as moving the mouse, or pressing a key, or whatever, gives a response that teaches them what the effect of their actions are. I have looked, but haven't found anything useful yet."
hi,
you can try doing a search on "lapware", (so named because the kids sits in your lap). I have many of the titles that will come up on that, and I am sorry to report that you will probably not be impressed.
All one would need would be, for example, some of the screen savers that come up on gnome by default (Xscreensaver? I don't know), but with the mouse changing a parameter, and maybe the keyboard switching to another screen saver.
Reader Rabbit's Toddler is not too bad (unfortunately our cd had been kidified, so my 22-month-old comes in regularly, tugging on my finger to get tech support when it tried to read a scrated area of the disk and crashes).
These programs frustrate me immensely in their closed-sourceness, howeer, because there are tiny little improvements (like being able to click to skip the introductory yakking) that would be easy to make and would make a huge difference for impatient toddlers.
Another thing you might try is subscribing to home-ed (I think home-ed-request@world.std.com) and posting your question there. That should net you a list of many titles and strong opinions in many directions.
good luck. also, feel free to email me if you have any more questions on this.
mike
Liberty uber alles.
A couple of years ago, when I was working in the software department at Fry's Electronics in Silicon Valley, the most popular children's software was the JumpStart series from Knowledge Adventure.
I received praise after praise from customers, who came back time and again to purchase more of their products as they released new ones. Knowledge Adventure has since expanded their product line considerably, breaking their software down into a few different categories, depending on the type of learning you're interested in.
From the sounds of it, you're looking for something along the lines of "JumpStart Baby" or "JumpStart Toddler", both a part of the "Full Grades" category. Other titles from this category include "JumpStart Preschool", "JumpStart Kindergarten", and a product each for 1st through 6th grades.
These titles come highly recommended from parents across the country (I know, I've spoken with them face-to-face!), although I've never looked at them myself (excuses: don't have kids yet, don't really have the money to buy software I won't use, I run mostly Linux).
The best thing is that nearly, if not, all of their products run on both Windows and Macintosh computers (hybrid CD-ROM), meaning almost everyone out there can take advantage of them. Unfortunately, they do not have a Linux version, and I am unsure as to whether or not they run under Wine, VMWare, or the like. If they do, I'd be interested to hear about it, as I'm sure many Linux-running parents and educators may want to hear as well.
On a side note, I'm sure all those parents out there that have been using the JumpStart series for a few years wouldn't mind donating the products that their children have outgrown to a school. Don't forget, just because your local school may have computers in the classroom now, that doesn't mean they have a huge amount of software, or the budget to purchase stuff for the kids to use. Don't throw out your old software, and don't even sell it in a garage sale. Donate it to your local school!
Don Head
UNIX/Linux Administrator
Try ABClassroom. The child can click letters on the screen or hit them on the keyboard, and the computer will say the letter. It also teaches shapes and colors, and has a "chalkboard."
The program is for Windows and costs nothing. It also makes it difficult for a child to exit the program, even disabling CTRL-ALT-DEL.
This might be too advanced for a 19-month-old. But it should be fine for a 24- to 30-month-old. If the child can click-and-drag, they will like the "chalkboard".
You might also try Crash, Bang, Wallop. I found the program to be a little annoying (too noisy!), but it is simple and very young kids will like it. It is also a free windows program.