Parents' Guide to Dexteria Jr.

App iPhone , iPod Touch , iPad Paid Education
Dexteria Jr. Poster Image

Common Sense Media Review

Mieke VanderBorght By Mieke VanderBorght , based on child development research. How do we rate?

age 4+

Strengthen fine motor skills with touch-screen games.

Parents Need to Know

Why Age 4+?

Any Positive Content?

  • Dexteria Jr. App: Screenshot #1
  • Dexteria Jr. App: Screenshot #2
  • Dexteria Jr. App: Screenshot #3
  • Dexteria Jr. App: Screenshot #4

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Privacy Rating Warning

  • Personal information is not sold or rented to third parties.
  • Personal information is not shared for third-party marketing.
  • Unclear whether this product displays personalised advertising.
  • Unclear whether data are collected by third-parties for their own purposes.
  • Unclear whether this product uses a user's information to track and target advertisements on other third-party websites or services.
  • Unclear whether this product creates and uses data profiles for personalised advertisements.
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What's It About?

In DEXTERIA JR., kids "Tap Squashes" until they're squished, "Pinch Peppers" to make them pop, or "Trace and Erase" lines that follow a particular pattern. They can choose their starting difficulty level, which automatically levels up as they play. Kids' performance is recorded in a few ways: levels completed, completion time, and accuracy (or number of peppers pinched/squashes squished). Performance data can be shared via email, although this option is protected by a wall. Performance can help provide parents with their child's handwriting readiness. Keeping a running record of progress helps parents share their child's progress with teachers and/or Occupational Therapist. An in-app purchase is necessary to create multiple accounts so more than one kid can record scores.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say : Not yet rated
Kids say : Not yet rated

Dexteria Jr. has a cute, appealing design. Though gameplay is relatively simple and game options are limited, kids likely will enjoy squishing the squash or popping the peppers as fast as they can. The tracking feature provides useful information that can help parents see how their kids' accuracy and speed are improving over time. But it would be nice to see some help for parents who want to interpret this data.

Kids will definitely get lots of practice with fine motor movements using their fingers. But as a tablet app, Dexteria Jr. raises an important question: Is this kind of flat-screen practice actually transferrable to the 3-D, physical world? Will pinching a pepper on the screen really prepare kids to hold a pencil? The tracing activity seems to be the most promising -- if, perhaps, the least engaging -- as it mimics letter-tracing workbooks and skills that may be more readily transferred beyond the screen. Parents can try to bridge a kid's experiences by referencing the actions in Dexteria Jr. explicitly as kids perform daily activities.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about skill level-appropriate goals. Challenge your kids to be as accurate, quick, and efficient as possible.

  • Help bring these motor skills into 3-D by having kids transfer what they learn to real-life scenarios, like holding a pencil, stringing items, or pinch-picking up cereal. Explicitly reference the actions they use in Dexteria Jr. by saying things like, "When you hold a pencil, your hand makes the same shape as when you pinch a pepper!"

App Details

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