A to Zap!

You Won’t Take A Nap In “A To Zap!”

A Review of A to Zap!

Tina Velgos

"A to Zap! " is not just another alphabet software program for kids.

There are 26 different and highly creative learning activities for

preschool kids (ages 3-6) to play with. Exciting new concepts are just a

mouse-click away in this magical world of alphabet blocks and the

"Sunbuddies", a bunch of zany cartoon characters.

This CD-ROM (Win/Mac) runs so smoothly that even young children can operate

it independently, without the help of an adult. It’s obvious that Sunburst

Communications is no newcomer to the K-12 educational software world

(they’ve been involved in educational software since 1982), although this

is their debut product in the home market.

An outstanding mix of audio adds to the crisp, letter-perfect narration by

kids. Click a letter of the alphabet for precise pronounciation and

spelling of preschool words. In the Alphabet Room, click on a letter, and a

word starting with that letter is spelled, letter by letter, on a toybox. A

toy will pop out of the toybox and by clicking the toy, it opens up a

fascinating activity for that letter.

Click on the broom, and kids can clean up the screen. When clicking the

camera, kids can take a picture of the screen and save and open pictures in

other applications. There are other options to change the letters to

uppercase or lowercase, hide the camera, add more spelling words, and

adjusting the volume.

A comprehensive Parents Guide accompanies "A to Zap! " which provides lots

of suggestions for parents to further stimulate their kids. Each letter

activity comes with challenging questions for kids to answer. This is what

interactive learning is all about!

My favorite activity was the M for Music section. Turn on the colorful

jukebox and play six different songs: ABC, classical, country, rock,

nursery rhyme and march. There are a variety of instruments kids can

experiment with (piano, harmonica, guitar, trumpet, and violin, to name a

few), or they can hear songs played by a bird, car or dog. Each letter in

the alphabet also has a note tool, which will sing the melody using the

letter name in place of words. A boffo feature was the ability to change

instruments in the middle of a song.

Timmy, age 4, and I enjoyed the P for Paint activity as we swirled our

virtual paintbrushes in buckets of marvelously brilliant paint cans. As we

picked a color by

clicking the brush on a can of paint, the paint name is pronounced and the

paint on the brush shows the new color. We painted each letter by clicking

the letter with the brush. One of the benefits of virtual painting is

there’s nothing to clean up afterwards.

The V for Vacuum activity was hilarious. We could remove letters from the

alphabet board by vacuuming them up. The letter appears under the blocks

and when you move the cursor over the letter, the letter cries out, "Help!

Put me back! " Of course, we moved the letter back to its home by clicking

on it and dragging it to its original position. It was also loads of fun

for Tim to click the vacuum cleaner on and off. If he would only vacuum

the floors in our house!

Don’t miss the A is for Airplane activity where you can watch virtual

planes zoom above an alphabet. By clicking any letter, the planes write

the letters in the sky. First, a large airplane draws the letter in

uppercase, then a smaller plane draws the lowercase letter.

I kept hearing a high-pitched voice cry, "Mommy, mommy" and thought I was

hearing things. If you’re a mom, you’ve certainly had the experience when a

kid cries "Mommy", that you instantly think its your child. Well, I had to

try out this activity. Five mother birds are nesting in a tree. When you

click a bird, she flies off her egg. Click the egg to watch a chick hatch

and cry out for its mommy!!! I was a little relieved! Then, you try to

match the chick with its mother. When you click from a chick to the right

mommy, the mother flies back to the nest.

Timmy enjoyed the race track game in the C is for Car activity. Cars race

along four roadways. The fun part for the kids is moving four track pieces

by clicking and dragging the mouse: a U-turn, a loop-the-loop, a jump ramp

and a color-changing tunnel. Clicking on the traffic light to make traffic

stop and go was a thumbs up adventure for Timmy.

Don’t forget the N is for Numbers activity. Kids can play with a screen

full of numbers, chalk boards and a play area. This is a virtual preschool

with fun zapping sounds and zany animated characters like dogs, elephants,

rabbits and turtles.

Of course, we liked the matching game called Y is for Yummy. The object of

the game is to match identical letters with treats. After all treats are

matched, wacky green monsters try to eat them. We used the wild lightning

bolts to zap the monsters and Tim giggled throught the whole zapping

adventure.

There are a gazillion reasons to like "A to Zap! ". Two thumbs up for

interactive software like this one, which is loaded with activities to make

learning letters, numbers and words a fun-filled adventure for preschool

kids.

School House Scorecard

Product:	A to Zap!
Company:	Sunburst Communications 101 Castleton Street Pleasantville, NY 10570 Phone: 800-321-7511 www.nysunburst.com/
Cost:	$49.95

System Requirements:

Macintosh:
Apple Macintosh 68040, System 7.0 or later,
4 MB RAM required (System 7.0 or 7.1), 5 MB RAM required (System 7.5),
13″ or larger monitor, 256 colors at 640 x 480 resolution or higher,
Double-speed or faster CD-ROM drive.

IBM:
IBM PC or compatible, 486/33 MHz processor, 8 MB RAM,
Windows 3.1 or higher, SVGA color monitor,
256 colors at 640 x 480 resolution,
Mouse or other Windows-compatible pointing device,
PC-compatible double speed or faster CD-ROM drive
and a PC Sound card.

Breakdown:

Ease of Use 4
Learning Value 5
Entertainment Value 4
Graphics 4
Sound 5

Overall Score: