Description
This is a terrific software series to build core cognitive and
thinking skills and have lots of fun at the same time. My children
played the Thinkin' Things series games for over 5 years - it was one of the games they enjoyed the most.
Thinkin' Things 1
This is the first in a family of Riverdeep products designed to offer
children, ages 4-8, a head start with a variety of thinking skills:
memory, auditory processing, critical thinking, problem solving and
creativity.
It focuses on 'how children learn'. Is your child more likely to
remember what is seen, or what is heard? How does your child approach
discovery learning? Does your child 'guess and test? Once something is
'discovered' does your child use that information in another way to 'see
what happens?' Does your child prefer to take Fripple orders at the door
(both auditory and visual), on the phone (auditory only), or by fax
(visual only)? Thinkin' Things allows children to learn through their
preferred modalities and strengths while encouraging growth and building
skills in other areas as well.
The main menu of Thinkin' Things lets you choose from six learning
activities.
Oranga
Banga - Develop creativity, auditory discrimination, and memory as
you improvise or repeat patterns. Strengthens auditory memory in a
non-verbal workout with percussion instruments - great fun!
Fripple Shop - Observe and compare attributes as you use
'and', 'or' and 'not'. Help each customer find just the right Fripple.
Greatly helps improve auditory processing of children.
Feathered Friends - Develop critical thinking ability as you
deduce rule and then build a Feathered Friend to test your
hypothesis. Involves matching and pattern recognition.
BLOX-Flying Spheres - Blend music, art, science, and play as
you experiment with motion and the illusion of depth. Create unique
visual effects to interpret different kinds of music.
Toony Loon - Increase memory and musical skills as you repeat
patterns or create tunes of your own on Toony's wacky xylophone.
This is a great non-verbal auditory processing work-out.
BOX-Flying Shapes - Discover spatial relationships. Create
your own works of kinetic art as you control the motion of shapes and
the sounds they make. Personally I find this option not overly
useful for autistic children - it can be used more as an incentive.
Activities allow students to build skills at their own pace. Reading
is not required, so both readers and non-readers can succeed.
Thinkin' Things 2
Once your child has mastered Thinnkin' Things 1 he or she is ready to
move on to Thinkin' Things 2, which provides similar activities, at but
at a bit more challenging level. The second in the Thinkin'
Things series focuses attention on how children learn. How does your
child approach
the new tools found in 2-3D BLOX and Snake BLOX? After discovering the
function of one tool, does your child combine that tool with another to
'see what happens?' Is your child more likely to remember what is seen
or what is heard? In playing Frippletration, is your child more
successful with visual problems or with auditory problems? (You can use
the 'see' and 'hear' Grow Slides to monitor progress).
Thinkin' Things 2 lets you choose from five learning activities:
Oranga Banga's Band - Develop rhythmic creativity and
awareness of rhythmic notation as you create one-, two- or three-part
patterns and are challenged to match what you see to what you hear.
2-3D BLOX - Create and map two-dimensional pictures onto
three-dimensional shapes. Build visual awareness as you experiment with
positive and negative space.
Snake BLOX - Use a 'making' tool to separate pictures into
foreground and background layers. Make paths over and under the layers
with a 'snake' of trailing shapes as you explore illusions and create
dynamic visual effects.
Flippletration - Play the traditional concentration game with
a new twist. Choose between 'See' or 'Hear' problems to develop visual
or auditory memory.
Activities allow students to build skills at their own pace. Reading
is not required, so both readers and non-readers can succeed.
Thinkin' Things 2 includes built-in scanning for single switch users
in some of the activities (Orange Banga's Band, Frippletration and
Toony's Tunes).
Thinkin' Things 3
Ages 7-13. As kids hit the double-digit ages, it gets harder
and harder to find good software. Only a handful of titles pass muster
with both parents and their increasingly independent-minded offspring. Thinkin'
Things Collection 3 is one of those rarities.
In Thinkin' Things newest product, kids ages 7-13 encounter five
thought-provoking activities and puzzles, which they tackle through a
process of trial and error, developing and testing hypotheses and
discovering for themselves what works - or doesn't work . They can try
their hand as detectives, commodity brokers and directors of a wild
half-time football show, explore special visual effects and conduct
"virtual" physics experiments.
As with many of the best products for this age range, Thinkin'
Things Collection 3 has no explicit instructions or rules. Kids
have to figure out WHAT they're supposed to be doing. Next they have to
figure out HOW to do it. Then, there's the additional pleasure of
figuring out how to do it better (and how to stump parents, siblings or
friends). As kids master one level of challenge, they can move the
"Grow Slide" to a more advanced level.
The bottom line: an outstanding collection of activities that really
challenge kids to think. Great for collaborative problem solving- or
solo play. If your kids enjoyed Thinkin' Things Collection 1 and 2,
they'll find plenty of fresh new challenges in Collection 3.
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