| Cool Kid Software (all apps) |
| FunBoard (Age 1+) | |||||||||||
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When I first downloaded FunBoard my initial reaction was “looks like a bit of fun, but not much educational merit”. However something did not sit quite right. It had been registered under the educational category in iTunes, the build quality was pretty good, so I asked a few questions and Eric at Cool Kit Software helpfully explained the intent. In a nutshell, the app is for very young children (one to two years old), not for older children. Big-T (my 3yo) enjoyed it, but its Little-J (my 1yo) that it was targetted at.
Once that realization is in place, things start to make a bit more sense. In the version reviewed, there is no writing, no speech – only sounds and images. (This also has a benefit of making it more internationally applicable.) If you get this app, I seriously suggest reading through this review to understand the educational goals of the app in order to understand the goals for helping your child develop. (Note: This is based on correspondence with Eric.)
This app was developed using concepts from a UK government site, Early Years Foundation Stage. That is, its not Cool Kit Software just inventing their own ideas on child education.
The Application
The app starts with a menu of 5 choices: a robot, a spaceship, a frog, a bell, and a caterpillar.
The robot mode has a robot that you can drag up and down to change its height. The educational concept is to teach the concept of height. (I would suggest you describe this to your child as they play with the app “Oh, look how TALL you made the robot”.)
The spaceship has a family of alien creatures (Dad, Mum, a little girl and little boy) descend. You can touch the different creatures and get different chord like sounds. You can slide your finger around as well (good for this age group who do not necessarily have the dexterity to touch single things well yet).
The frog when touched shows different emotions in sound and facial expressions. Understanding emotions is an important skill for young children to pick up. (I would suggest you describe each emotion to your child as they occur.)
The bell rings and changes colors when you touch or swipe it. Young children can swipe much easier than touch a specific point on the screen. As a parent you can say the color names out loud. Teaches a bit of cause and effect.
The caterpillar inches along the screen. It will follow to where you touch. If you touch the caterpillar it giggles. (See below however!) Encourages some coordination in where to touch.
The Good
- The graphics and sound effects are pretty good.
- Its dead easy to interact with.
- Many of the interactions take into account the age group (you can swipe instead of just touch).
- Moving between the main menu and sub items has cute little animations. Going back to the main menu for example has the little bird lay an egg which opens and out comes the options. Even this has a bit of educational merit – introducing the idea that animals like birds lay eggs, then things come of of the eggs.
- There are sound educational concepts behind many of the things the app does, for the target age group.
The Bad
You may debate whether some of these are good or bad points. Maybe “points to note” might be a better heading.
- The caterpillar is a little stilted in its movements. There are only two images in the animation sequence and if you change direction it feels a bit abrupt the way it just instantly jumps to face the new direction. Maybe one more image in the animation sequence and have it rotate smoothly to the new direction instead of just jump instantly.
- If the caterpillar is near the center of the page and you say touch in a corner for it to go in that direction, it may just turn but not actually move because the caterpillar is a large percentage of the screen size already. Touching around the screen resulted in it spinning around but not actually moving.
- If you tickle the caterpillar, it giggles. I must say my immediate reaction of the facial expression was that it was in pain. Eric assures me its smiling, not in pain. Others have made the same comment however. But hey, a bit of contraversy does liven up the day doesn’t it?
- It was not immediately obvious to me what the idea behind each mode was until I asked. Could be improved here a bit. To get the full value out of the app parents need to understand its goals.
- To get the most out of the app a parent needs to be present and re-enforce the concepts. (Mind you, I would not leave my iPhone with little-J unsupervised anyway!)
- For the alien music mode, I am not sure I like the vibrate when you touch the spaceship. Vibrate has got negative reactions in the past on other apps. Vibrate is normally used when you do something wrong.
- With a bit more work I think the app could be extended to appeal to a wider age group. E.g. by displaying English words for the emotions with the frog and saying them out loud. This would tie it to English of course, making it less international (without a bit of work). This may also help parents understand what the objectives of the app are.
- The frog (showing different emotions) is an example of falling short of full potential. You touch the frog to cycle through different facial expressions and emotions. However the face is quite small (so some expressions hard to see) and the different emtions are not the result of anything. That is, the frog gets angry, embarrassed etc for no particular reason. There is no cause and effect.
- This app suffers from the same problem as many others for very young children. For Little-J (my 1yo), he grabs the phone and holds on with both hands for dear life. He won’t let go. But both hands are on the touch area. When I try to touch the screen, it frequently does not register. I have to get him to get his fingers off the display to make any progress in this game and others. I wonder if its a problem with the iPhone operating system itself.
Educational Value
Its very important to understand this is for very young children. Its trying to teach early concepts like emotions – not advanced concepts like reading or writing. When you dig a bit deeper, the ideas are sound – if not necessarily immediately obvious. (At least they were not all obvious to me!). This app is not going to turn your child into Einstein, but it was designed based on sound educational concepts. I think you get a lot more out of this app if you understand the goals as a parent, and reinforce the concepts behind the app as you sit with your child.
My Score
3.5 stars. The app is built on educational concepts for the target age group which I applaud (I almost gave it 4 stars for this reason), but it falls short a little too much for me to give it a higher score. While it does have educational merit, it is not outstanding. It is however certainly worth a look for very young children, given that its free (at the time of review). Big-T (my 3yo) enjoys fiddling with it even if he is not learning much.
Get it in iTunes
More information, screen shots, and user reviews can be found in the iTunes store.
Other Suggestions
- Coordination: iWriteWords Tracing Game, Alphabetic, Animal SNAP!, Drum Kit, BubbleWrap
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