The day begins in Charlie Brown's bedroom as he prepares for school. Children can click on almost any object in the room to bring the object to life or hear a humorous sound effect. When they do, the object's name is spoken and the word appears at the bottom of the screen. At any time, children can view a dictionary entry for the word simply by clicking on the word.
Each of the seven scenes in Charlie Brown's day has a fun letter--or word-related activity--in this case, helping Charlie Brown dress for the day. Users do this by dragging clothing and accessories from the closet to a waiting Charlie Brown. As the children select items they also see and hear the name of the item. In later scenes, children get the chance to help Snoopy complete a story, unscramble sentences, create rhyming words, participate in a spelling bee, and play hangman and concentration. Each activity is hosted by a Peanuts character and is playable at three levels of difficulty. A higher level of difficulty usually means longer words, more choices, or written clues instead of pictures.
This title is one of the few spelling programs that incorporates a dictionary. Integrated into the program is an illustrated, 1,000-word dictionary. Whenever a word is displayed during a scene or game, a click will take the child to the word's dictionary entry. Here, a Peanuts character will pronounce the word, define it, and use it in a sentence. Users can even see the word used in an original Peanuts comic strip. Cross-references are available to enable jumping quickly to related words, and a central index makes it easy to find a specific entry. From almost every screen in the program the dictionary is no more than a click away, encouraging children to use it.
The familiar voices, music, and animation of this title will rival any Charlie Brown television special. Its user interface is intuitive and easy, with controls for moving between scenes, accessing the dictionary, and starting an exercise arranged along the bottom of the screen. To help new users, the title includes an animated tour and it begins each exercise with a narrated description of the activity. If a child has difficulty with an exercise, the program is quick to give hints or narrow the choices.
The publisher recommends this title for children as young as age four, a somewhat optimistic recommendation. Children need to know the alphabet for almost all of the activities and should be beginning readers for most. While younger children can perform one or two of the simpler activities, parents should not expect them to handle all of them.
There are many titles designed to help kids learn spelling and vocabulary--some are worth owning, while others are not. Get Ready for School, Charlie Brown!TM is one that is worth owning. An intuitive user interface, coupled with top-notch music and animation, makes it fun to use. Its activities, like Hangman and the Spelling Bee, may seem like old standbys, but the title presents them with an entertaining, Peanuts-style twist. More important, they are challenging and effective at improving spelling and vocabulary. While no one will view the integrated dictionary as a substitute for a full-featured multimedia dictionary, its entries are all first vocabulary words and the program fosters its use. With Get Ready for School, Charlie Brown!TM parents looking for a way to improve their child's spelling skills may find themselves encouraging him or her to spend a day with Charlie Brown.
Dustin Kassman writes and reviews software in Corvallis, OR.
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