ABC-CD

KS1 (Years 1 - 2)

English

This title can be used to support the Language and Literacy section of the under 5s Curriculum and also be used to support the Literacy Strategy for early phonic knowledge, linking letter shapes and sounds to objects beginning with the same letter. It uses the appealing character of 'Alphabod' to guide the children through the different activities.

I have found this CD-ROM a useful tool for teaching letters of the alphabet in my classroom, in particular to those children who have not been inspired by other more formal methods of learning letter sounds and shapes and who, to date, have picked up very few sounds. The children found this package fun, interactive and engaging. It was able to hold the attention of children who normally have a short attention span for up to 20 minutes and the aspect I found particularly useful from a teacher's point of view was that it was easy to use so that during the 20-minute group work of the Literacy Hour, the children working on the computer could work independent of assistance. The class have become quite computer-literate over the year and can solve some problems themselves, but it is rare to find a package that will keep their concentration and not cause any problems for such a long period of time.

The only draw backs I found were that a few of the letter sounds when spoken were not clear to some children. Also, although the instructions were verbal, the pictures in the 'I Spy' game were not read out so if the children could not name the item, they could not necessarily identify the correct answer. Reading out the pictures would help the children who cannot identify letter sounds, but can hear them in words.

My classroom computer is an RM Window Box machine so the installation of the program has to be done in the 'manager'. The installation was quick and uncomplicated and did not change any of the machine configuration, or conflict with any of the programs on my computer. The book and onscreen instructions were straightforward and easy to follow. As it is installed on manager, the only way for the children to access it without having access to the manager is to move it into the 'user' section. This too was simple and I only had to drag the icon for the CD-ROM into the user using the 'classmate manager'. After this, the icon appeared on the user screen with the other CD-ROM titles and was easy to access and quick enough for classroom use.

Curriculum Relevance

ABC-CD supports the word level work of the National Literacy Strategy, the Reception objectives are:

- 2a: hearing and identifying initial sounds in words.

- 3a: sounding and naming each letter of the alphabet in lower case.

It also supports the Language and Literacy element of the under 5s Curriculum, the objective is:

- link sounds to letters, naming and sounding the letters of the alphabet.

Design & Navigation

All the activities can be accessed through the main menu, although these can be accessed through the use of the Option page. The Option page allows the teacher to set the difficulty level for the activities and select the letters they want the children to work. The volume, game type to be played and number of tries the children will have can also be set on this screen.

The three difficulty levels are logically thought out e.g., in the letter shape activity the 'easy' level only selects letters that are easily distinguished between, this progresses to the hardest level where the letter shapes are quite similar e.g. b and d, letters which children often confuse.

Ease of Use

One of the advantages of this software is that, once shown what to do, my class could use it unaided. All the children have had extensive experience and tuition of using a computer over their time in the class, but to use this program all a child needs to be able to do is to select and click on an icon. The instructions are given verbally so there is no need for the operator to be a reader and instructions can be repeated using the sound icon.

The children need only click on an arrow to take them between screens and the icons are of a sensible size. The icons are also easily accessible and many are self-explanatory as to their use e.g. a picture of an eye to access the animation, or easily remembered for re-use e.g., the use of a spiral for the 'morphing'.

The children can however, access the Options menu, but this was the only instance in which I had to go and help the groups. It is possible for the children to quit the application themselves, or leave a set activity and go back to the menu, but these icons are smaller and are not set up so that they can be easily inadvertently clicked.

Another plus to this CD-ROM is that it is supplied with letter cards displaying the letter and the object it morphs into on the reverse. There are also some worksheets and in the User Guide a list of follow-up activities. There is also clipart located on the CD-ROM.

Literacy

The relevance of this program to the National Literacy Strategy has been highlighted above in 'Curriculum Relevance'. This program has become an exceedingly useful tool to aid the teaching of letter sounds and shapes in my classroom and its ease of use allows children to work in a small group independent of teacher intervention for, in my experience the whole of the group task time of the Literacy Hour if need be.

Special Needs

As this program contains engaging animation, spoken instructions and interesting activities it appealed to my Special Educational Needs children in a way that no other method of teaching phonics has in my classroom, holding their attention for considerable periods of time. The different levels also make it easy to set for the children who are going to use the software.

Research Evidence

There is no published information on this, or similar titles in the classroom other than the materials that accompanied the CD-ROM.

Courseware

The activities are easily and reliably accessed, they do not get progressively more difficult as the children work through them; the difficulty has to be set. Feedback is given on the activities so that the children know when they have made a mistake, but if they continually get the question wrong it will not persist, but move onto the next screen. The character 'Alphabod' who guides the children through the games gives positive feedback for the correct answer and there is a voice that kindly commiserates for a wrong answer. There is not however, any record available on the program of the children's achievements. The only way to assess the child's understanding of letter sounds and shapes is to observe their game play.

Conclusion

ABC-CD is a useful and practical tool for the reinforcement of teaching sounds and shapes of letters of the alphabet. It is also an effective support for the Literacy Hour's Reception 'word level' work. It has captured the interest and enthusiasm of many in my class over the few weeks it has been in use and has pleased me because it has allowed the children to work independent of adult help, once they had been shown how the program is manipulated. I have used it effectively with individuals, groups and also with the whole class. This CD-ROM has been a delight to use and has been enjoyed by children and staff alike.

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Product Overview

This product is distributed by Sherston (Tel: 01666 843200)