Dora ABCs Vol 1: Letters & Letter Sounds
By Dana Anderson,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Easy-to-play games are great practice for pre-readers.
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Dora ABCs Vol 1: Letters & Letter Sounds
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Based on 1 parent review
Only Dora is interesting for kids. The app itself is not impressive at all.
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What’s It About?
Players help Dora the Explorer's friend Tico fly his plane to write letters. As kids trace the letter with Tico's plane by following little acorn markers down a shaded letter shape, they'll hear Dora in the background saying the phonetic letter sound (for example, "eks" for the letter "x"). The other game on this app requires kids to tilt the device to drop lowercase letters into an acorn containing the uppercase match. After the player completes both games for a letter, a colorful picture emerges from the clouds of an object that begins with the letter (for example, an apple for "a").
Is It Any Good?
For very young app users and pre-readers, this is a fun, easy game with very little room for frustration. If the player goes slightly off track, the acorns disappear and reappear again where the letter is supposed to be traced, and the game in which players tilt the device to drop the acorns in the right spots doesn't require kids to hit the spot precisely.
The app also offers a brief curriculum overview for parents, and you can track each player's progress. It's a good choice for Dora fans.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Follow your kid's progress in the "report card" section of the app.
Encourage your child to trace letters in other real-life objects such as sand, flour, or soap suds.
App Details
- Devices: iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad
- Subjects: Language & Reading: letter or word recognition, phonics, reading
- Skills: Self-Direction: academic development, Thinking & Reasoning: deduction, making conclusions
- Release date: April 16, 2012
- Category: Education
- Topics: Numbers and Letters
- Publisher: Nickelodeon
- Version: 1.5
- Minimum software requirements: iOS 3.0 or later
- Last updated: August 19, 2016
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