Kalley's Machine Plus Cats

I generally don’t take the time to review apps . .but this one got me really excited. I am an education professor and also an Apple Distinguished Educator and i only heard about this App when it was free for a day. its an interactive book that has appropriate reading strategies. I just spent about 30 minutes using it with my 4 year old nephew. He played it again and again and liked each of the machines. One thing that I thought was cool, he kept asking why the “marshmallows” reset on each screen. Auntie I made it small, why is it big again? it lead to a good discussion on how programmers make each page work.. (His daddy is a computer engineer). The reading level is appropriate and it gives good feedback and allows each word to be spoken. The only bit of suggestion for improvement I would include would be to have something interactive on the last page or the the end page. My nephew was a little disappointed that everything was just “over” . .but he went back and started the book again.. (Maybe an interactive hug) .. So who would be interested.. I think this is really appropriate for maker education as well.. i could see using it as an intro to a lesson on designing machines.

My kids love the cats!

My toddler likes this game, but she finds it very frustrating that when she is just touching the screen to make something move, over half the time she swipes to another page. Since this app is premised on kids touching the screen, please at least allow parents to disable the swipe feature.