So Smart! First Words

“House. A yellow house with two windows sat on a hill. House.” No one said that vocabulary-building was particularly exciting, and this format of stating the word, using it in a sentence, and repeating the word, is proof enough. Fortunately, for the attention spans of the target audience of 9-to-36-month-olds, the words and sentences are enlivened both by simple, yet colorful, computer-generated graphics featuring geometric shapes coming together to form the given example and by exceptionally pleasant original music. According to the on-screen written introduction, “parents can facilitate their child's learning by naming objects and asking questions,” so when “boat” came up, I asked my 15-month-old son to go find his boat, and sure enough, he toddled over to the toy box and pulled it out. Besides its obvious utility in English-speaking households, this could also serve those for whom English is a second language (though the lack of narration for the written introduction is limiting). Recommended. Aud: P. (R. Reagan)