Sometimes when reviewing an app, it can be hard to separate your feelings about it from whether or not it is actually good or not. Super Why ABC Adventures: Alphabet is one of those cases. Based on the PBS show, the app is aimed at preschoolers aged four and up and teaches the alphabet through five games, each one hosted by a different Super Reader.
First of all let's get my thoughts out of the way. This app is really, really annoying. The music in the background is obnoxious if you leave it on beyond 30 seconds and the characters all talk too loudly as if they are shouting at my child. The colors are bright to the point of being garish; in fact the whole thing gives that chaotic sense of standing in a school playground with loud, boisterous activity exploding all around you. It's stimulating in the excess and there is no shutting it out when it's on in the same room - especially those alphabet songs. "U is for umbrella, lickety letters I'm your alphabet fella!" screeches a cartoon pig as I debate claiming on my insurance for an iPad that somehow managed to fly out of a window. There is a tracker in the settings that allows you to monitor how well your child is progressing with learning their letter sounds and names. This might be useful for older children, but for younger children who are guessing their way through the games it gives false data.
But I'm not the person this app was designed for, and my three year old son would almost certainly design a learning environment very different from the one I might create for him. He loves this app, not as much as some others we've reviewed together but he's still choosing to switch it on regularly during iPad time. When we first downloaded it for review I worried that I'd made a mistake as the games seemed way too advanced for his age. If I'm honest they are too old (he’s only just turned three and the app is aimed at four plus) but my son is nothing if not persistent and that hasn't stopped him. He is now able to trace out his letter shapes accurately almost every time and he's starting to learn some of their names too. Other activities on the app such as choosing objects that begin with a specific letter are way above him, but the games encourage him to keep trying and eventually he selects all the correct ones with the game heaping on the praise. It makes me happy to see him determined to complete the task as he can often give up at the slightest hint of difficulty; something about the bright, loud cartoons seems to make him want to keep trying, and hearing letter names and spellings repeated out loud over and over again can only be helpful in the long term. Successful completion of different games is rewarded with stickers than can be used on a world map. Interestingly my son has never bothered with this feature despite being obsessed with creating sticker scenes from his Alien Buddies reward stickers. There are also a number of alphabet song videos that your child can watch if they'd rather absorb passively for a while.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-PaeO7DKY0[/youtube]
Super Why is far from the top of my personal favorite apps list but it could well end up as one of your child's preferred activities, and the educational benefits it provides outweigh any parental annoyance it may cause.
Super Why ABC Adventures: Alphabet is available on the iTunes App Store for $3.99 (iPad) or $2.99 (iPhone). A copy of the iPad app was provided free for this review.
