Misleading title, okay entertainment for preschoolers
Dawn Davidson | Florida, USA | 06/09/2010
(2 out of 5 stars)
"They use the term 'educational' very loosely here. An owl puppet runs through the alphabet one letter at a time, and certain letters get a themed story while the owl narrates and other random puppet faces appear to point out "A is for Adam" and "A is for airplane", etc. There is no teaching of letter sounds, and no repetition to reinforce the supposed "word recognition" going on. Each letter appears only briefly as the owl names it, with the upper and lower case letter appearing at the same time, one above the other, in a way that could be confusing for children who are not already familiar with their letters. Furthermore they are superimposed over background imagery which interferes with the shape of the letter on the bottom. The stories are animated only by zooming in and out and otherwise manipulating static illustrations. Reading Rainbow uses this to great effect; this program, not so much. Two stars for keeping my three-year-old more or less engaged for twenty minutes, and I'd rather he watch something simple like this than the loud ADHD-inspired junk on TV, but don't expect your child to learn any reading fundamentals."