sterling@acf5.NYU.EDU (John Burr Sterling) (03/07/88)
I'm interested in software for little kids. Say, 2 years old. Is there any thing out there on the Amiga? For those who think this is a bit extreme, here is an example: If you hit an alphabetic key, an object with that as the initial letter appears. Done right, this would be a neat dynamic diplay, like a zebra racing across the screen, kicking up dust. Or a big zipper, that unzips and then zips back up again. With the Amiga, there could be good sound effects (eg. the clomping of the zebra's hooves) and a voice saying the letter and the object displayed. The critical feature are that the kid gets interesting feedback for nearly any input (even the non-alpha keys could be set up to do something fun - maybe just display themselves, then melt or pop or fly away...). And that he does have some "control" over getting neat things to happen. I know my son loves to play with the keys on my terminal when it's offline. Software that uses keyboard overlays are nice is principle, but in the ones I've seen for the comodore-64, the overlays fit poorly. Similarly joystick interfaces must be very "forgiving" so that the child doesn't "get stuck" and not have anything happen. Thanks for your time, John Sterling sterling@lang1.cs.nyu.edu
rminnich@udel.EDU (Ron Minnich) (03/09/88)
In article <880001@acf5.NYU.EDU> sterling@acf5.NYU.EDU (John Burr Sterling) writes: >I'm interested in software for little kids. Say, 2 years old. Is >there any thing out there on the Amiga? > >For those who think this is a bit extreme, here is an example: If you >hit an alphabetic key, an object with that as the initial letter >appears. Done right, this would be a neat dynamic diplay, like a >zebra racing across the screen, kicking up dust. Or a big zipper, i did something like this in amigabasic. Starting with the balls demo as a base. Letters (up to 10) would get tossed out and bounce around at random speeds and initial locations. When my son hit a key corresponding to the letter the letter would blow up. Oh, and when the letter first came out it would say its name. Problems: 1) I can't draw an explosion. 2) I can't make a good explosion sound 3) The killer. !@#$% Amigabasic kept guru-ing the machine. Another microsoft toy. Faced with the prospect of learning how to do all this in c with my lack of time i just bagged it.But it is not too hard, if only microsoft could write code. Might work in (dare i say it) forth. ron -- ron (rminnich@udel.edu)
ali@polya.STANFORD.EDU (Ali Ozer) (03/09/88)
In article <1417@louie.udel.EDU> Ron Minnich writes: >In article <880001@acf5.NYU.EDU> John Burr Sterling writes: >>I'm interested in software for little kids. Say, 2 years old. Is >>there any thing out there on the Amiga? > .... When my son hit >a key corresponding to the letter the letter would blow up. >Oh, and when the letter first came out it would say its name. >Problems: >1) I can't draw an explosion. >2) I can't make a good explosion sound >3) The killer. !@#$% Amigabasic kept guru-ing the machine. If you want to create interactive animations yourself (without C programming), you might want to consider The Director: With just the Director and a decent Paint program you should be able to create almost any animation sequence. And what's better, you can make it interact with the user --- Accept key punches, mouse clicks, even track the mouse. Writing Director programs is very much like writing in Basic, except you have a lot of graphics/IFF primitives already defined for you. You even have the capability of reading from and writing to files. (But of course there are some AmigaBASIC features you won't find in the Director, such as menus, floating point numbers, and decent string manipulation routines, among other things.) With the Director, I imagine you should be able to create fun toys for your kids faster than they can digest them... Ali Ozer, ali@polya.stanford.edu
jea@ur-cvsvax.UUCP (Joanne Albano) (03/09/88)
Our 2 year old enjoys pounding keys with First letters and words by First Byte. It has several little games. One is paint the dinosaur by using the mouse to select a color when it tells you a body part. After the dinosaur is colored it plays a song. Another is Magic letter machine. The kid punches a letter, it is drawn in a box on the screen after the magic letter machine munches on it a while and then it says the letter and puts up a picture like... "A is for apple". My only criticism is that the action is a little slow for the toddler age group. Of course at 2 years the kiddos need supervision at the keyboard or as he calls it.. "Putkeys". -- =================================================================== Joanne Albano, Center for Visual Science (716) 275-6848 Room 256 Meliora Hall, Univ. of Rochester, Rochester NY 14627 UUCP: ur-cvsvax!jea@rochester.EDU ARPANET: UR-CVSVAX!JEA@ROCHESTER.ARPA
rogerh@arizona.edu (Roger Hayes) (03/10/88)
In article <723@ur-cvsvax.UUCP> jea@ur-cvsvax.UUCP (Joanne Albano) writes: > >Our 2 year old enjoys pounding keys with First letters and >words by First Byte. I must recommend against Talking Notebook (I forget the exact name) by FirstByte. It's too slow to be usable and it's buggy. It would be a cute program if it worked, although it is clearly not an Amiga program but a port, probably from an Apple-II. But it's so slow that my 5 year old was convinced she'd broken the computer when she tried it; she refuses to use it now, even though she's fascinated by words and letters. Roger Hayes rogerh@arizona.edu
UH2@PSUVM.BITNET (Lee Sailer) (03/11/88)
Let's vote on comp.sys.amiga.kids 8-) Anyway, My 4 year old and 6.5 year old daughters play Marble Madness, but badly. They don't seem to like it much, since it is too hard, using a mouse. Might be better with a joystick. They can play with DPAINT for hours if they are in the right mood. One day, the 6 year old played quite a bit with The Music Studio, but never since. (Besides, I traded it for something else, and erased my copy a few weeks later.) I see all these Donald Duck and Winnie T. Pooh things, and Math Wizard type stuff from Mark of the Unicorn, but am hesitant to shell out $30--$50 a pop unless I know they'll like it. So I'd happily read any reviews of this type software here, from the netlanders I feel I can trust. lee
ssd@sugar.UUCP (Scott Denham) (03/11/88)
In article <880001@acf5.NYU.EDU>, sterling@acf5.NYU.EDU (John Burr Sterling) writes: > I'm interested in software for little kids. Say, 2 years old. Is > there any thing out there on the Amiga? > I've had good luck with 3 programs that both my 2 year old and 5 year old enjoy a great deal (though at a different level, of course). The favorite is First Shapes (First Byte) which has some good pattern matching and color/size/shape exercises. The second favorite is JMH's Talking Coloring Book, a kiddie Deluxe Paint of sorts. It also attempts to teach the names of the colors. The 3rd (much to my astonishment) is Flight Simulator!! They both crash alot, but they get a kick out of it, and have gotten reasonably proficient at keeping it in the air if I take off and get 'em up to a few thousand feet or so. We also tried Match-it (the Other guys) which mostly duplicates what's in First Shapes, and is rather clunky and unexciting by comparison. > John Sterling > sterling@lang1.cs.nyu.edu
grinstei@hawk.ulowell.edu (Georges Grinstein) (03/15/88)
In article <35588UH2@PSUVM> UH2@PSUVM.BITNET (Lee Sailer) writes: >Let's vote on comp.sys.amiga.kids 8-) > >Anyway, My 4 year old and 6.5 year old daughters play Marble Madness, >but badly. They don't seem to like it much, since it is too hard, using >a mouse. Might be better with a joystick. > My 4.5 feels the same however my 7 year old son has flipped out on it and is quite successfull with the mouse. >I see all these Donald Duck and Winnie T. Pooh things, and Math Wizard >type stuff from Mark of the Unicorn, but am hesitant to shell out >$30--$50 a pop unless I know they'll like it. I got Math Wizard. The UI is horrible. It basically has some neat pictures and tests arithmetic problems. After 10 of a particular kind it comes back to screen 1 and again asks for name, etc... Very poor UI. >So I'd happily read any reviews of this type software here, from >the netlanders I feel I can trust. Ditto. Dr. Georges Grinstein Director - Graphics Research Laboratory grinstein@ulowell.edu University of Lowell (617)-452-5000 x2681 Lowell, MA 01854
berry@well.UUCP (John Thomas Berry) (03/16/88)
Re: software for little kids
My 5 year-old really likes Uncle D's ConSOUNDtration from Alohafonts.
This is a version of the old concentration card game which has you match
cards which have been turned over and placed in a grid. This variation
places letters, numbers, or pictures in one grid and digitized sounds
in the other. One must match the letter, number, or picture with its
associated sound. There are 4 levels of play (different size grids), and
one or two-player options. The company also sells data disks of French,
Spanish, and German versions of the game. It's a good game which you can
play with your children -- it's challenging for adults too -- the 5x5
grid is really hard.
Nancy Berryacphssrw@csuna.UUCP (Stephen R. Walton) (03/16/88)
In article <35588UH2@PSUVM> UH2@PSUVM.BITNET (Lee Sailer) writes: > >Anyway, My 4 year old and 6.5 year old daughters play Marble Madness, >but badly. They don't seem to like it much, since it is too hard, using >a mouse. Might be better with a joystick. I'm surprised (but define "badly"). My 3.5 year old son plays with the mouse, and quite well. He can now get all the way to the moving sand on the second level by himself. We agree that the mouse is better than the joystick :-). >They can play with DPAINT for hours if they are in the right mood. Ditto. As for other packages: I risked $25 on "Uncle D's ConSoundTration" from AlohaFonts. It is a Concentration-type game which presents you with two n by n panels (2 <= n <= 6). Behind the left-hand group are pictures, letters, or numbers, and behind the right-hand group are the sounds (digitized, not via the speech synthesizer). The 3.5 year old has played it some, not alot, but more than I expected, actually. The hidden educational value is obvious. And on the 6 by 6 size, it is quite a challenge for adults. My biggest problem with Amiga stuff for kids is user interfaces. ConSoundTration has a carefully designed and clever interface which allows kids who can't read yet to operate the game completely. The only other game my son can play by himself is Amoeba Invaders, since a push of the joystick fire button starts a new game. All others require selection of menu items for play, even those which are otherwise easy enough for him. A shame. Stephen Walton, representing myself swalton@solar.stanford.edu Cal State, Northridge rckg01m@calstate.BITNET
bob@ogg.cgrg.ohio-state.edu (Bob Marshall) (03/21/88)
My daughter started using New Techology Coloring Book from The Software Toolworks when she was about 3 1/2. It uses a "paint by numbers" scheme, or more accurately "fill by numbers". The images are from various scientific areas. Her favorites are the Skylab and the Shuttle. She is able to do it all herself, turning on the amiga, loading the disks, clicking the start message and then selecting the pull-down menu for the image catalog and picking the image to load. This is all done with the mouse. She hates the keyboard and insists on putting it in the "garage" before starting. The other menu options (color changes, etc.) are too complicated to select. While she can handle parts of other programs, this is the only program that she has been able to master all by herself. I would like to see more little kid oriented software. Also, I would like to see simpler interfaces in general (simple mouse actions, limited keyboard usage, simple menus, icons). Then, little kids could have more fun with the amiga. Robert Marshall Ohio Supercomputer Graphics Project bob@ogg.cgrg.ohio-state.edu