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Dally Doo 2 Alphabet By Pam Gleichman Tribune Media Services Dally Doo 2, an introduction to the alphabet for young children, offers seven activities, each of which is depicted in a colorful rectangle that appears on the right side of the screen. The activities include Lessons, Sort, Match, Search, Find, Count and I Spy. By clicking on Lessons, you will go through the alphabet letter by letter. Each letter is spoken and a simple picture is given to correspond with each letter. In the sorting game, the screen shows "candy" and each piece shows an upper and lower case letter. You must put the lower case letters in one bag and the upper case letters in another. You also sort crayons and marbles. In I Spy, you�ll see a screen full of letters. The computer "speaks" and shows a letter, after which you have to find the letter on the screen. In Search, a letter is shown and you must turn over squares to find the matching letter. Each game offers spoken instructions, simple animations and music. Dally Doo 2 is bright and colorful. I played the program and thought the activities were simple, cute and educational. I also thought the program would be a hit. Our testers, however, disagreed. The 3-year-old set found the activities too difficult. Without having any successes, they quickly lost interest. Older children couldn't find an activity that would keep their interest and, as a result, kept changing from one activity to another. Search was the only activity they completed successfully. After 10 minutes, they wanted to "do something else." I had them play Dally Doo 2 Animals. This program has the same format and activities using the animal theme. They liked this program much better. Publisher : Arc Media, 238 Davenport Road No. 306, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5R 1J6. Category : Early learning. Age : 3 to 6. Installation : Dally Doo 2 needs no installation. It is run entirely from the CD. Use : Dally Doo 2 Alphabet is easy to use once children are in the program. The opening menu is very difficult for children; they'll need help starting and exiting the program. Graphics : Bright and colorful. Written Materials : There are no written materials, though none are needed to play the game. Installation instructions are printed directly on the CD. System Requirements : Windows 3.1, NT or Windows 95, 486 PC, 16 MB available RAM, 16 bit color with 640 X 480 resolution, double speed CD ROM drive, Sound Blaster Compatible, Mouse. Macintosh � 16 MB available RAM, Color monitor 16 bit color with 640 x 480 resolution, CD-ROM drive, System 7.0 or greater. Tested Version : Windows 3.1/NT/95/Macintosh CD-ROM. Cost : $12.99. Rating : One star. Although Dally Doo 2 Alphabet appears to be a cute program with good content, it fell flat with almost all of our testers. I recommend � as a program with similar price and content � Jumpstart ABCs by Knowledge Adventure. DEAR PAM : As the grandmother of six, I look to your column for advice. I have been very pleased with the purchases I have made following your recommendations. Could you print a review column with all your best choices for the year (with age levels) to be used as a Holiday Gift list guide? DEAR READER : Thank you for your kind words. My Holiday Gift Buying Guide will appear the first week of December. WEB SITE OF THE WEEK FUN AND GAMES WITH HARRY POTTER http://www.scholastic.com/harrypotter/funngames.htm How much do you know about Harry Potter? Play fun games and see how much you know. Download a Harry Potter screensaver. RATING KEY : ***** � Outstanding; **** � Very Good; *** � Good; ** � Fair; * � Not Worth Purchasing. Pam Gleichman welcomes questions/comments from readers. Write to Pam at Tribune Media Services, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 1400, Chicago, Ill. 60611. Send e-mail to [email protected] . © 1999 Tribune Media Services, Inc. Techno file index Mail Tribune Copyright © The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA