Sentence Sensibility
Common Sense says
- iPad
- Free to try
- Educational Games
Parents say
Kids say
Searching for streaming and purchasing options ...
Common Sense is a nonprofit organization. Your purchase helps us remain independent and ad-free.
Get it now on
Searching for streaming and purchasing options ...
Did this review miss something on diversity?
Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive, diverse representations in books, TV shows, and movies. Want to help us help them? Suggest a diversity update
Suggest an update Sentence Sensibility
A lot or a little?
The parents' guide to what's in this app.
What parents need to know
Parents need to know that Sentence Sensibility is a sentence-building app for iPad. It features two games that invite kids to drag word and punctuation mark tiles around on-screen to build sentences from famous works of literature, including Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, and the Declaration of Independence. You can download the app for free and access some of its levels; you'll need to purchase a Touch Press Games subscription to access all levels and use the game beyond a one-week free trial period. Read the privacy policy to find out about the types of information collected and shared.
Stay up to date on new reviews.
User Reviews
- Parents say
- Kids say
There aren't any reviews yet. Be the first to review this title.
There aren't any reviews yet. Be the first to review this title.
What's it about?
In SENTENCE SENSIBILITY, kids move word tiles around on-screen to create complete sentences. There are two games available. In Unscramble, kids move words and punctuation tiles into order to re-create sentences from works of literature. Remix invites kids to use the words from the sentences they constructed in Unscramble to create as many new sentences as they can, as fast as they can. Kids earn points for creating longer and more complex sentences, and they can slowly unlock additional levels as they earn high scores. Most levels are only available with a paid Touch Press Games subscription.
Is it any good?
While the unique activities are amusing, more learning content around language and its parts might give more context. The Remix game is the real highlight, letting you build as many sentences as you can from the words in a sentence from literature. The biggest drawback is that there isn't much context: You earn points for including different components of a sentence, such as an infinitive or an independent clause, but those terms aren't defined anywhere, and it's not clear why one might earn more points than another. Also, if you haven't read the works that these sentences are drawn from, it's not clear what the sentences are about. Plus, you still get points for sentences that are grammatically correct but don't make much sense, like "The sensation caused a speech." Overall, Sentence Sensibility is an amusing way to play with language and to see just how many ways you can remix a few words, but it may not keep kids occupied for long.
Talk to your kids about ...
Families can talk about the context of the sentences that appear in Sentence Sensibility. What might have been happening in the book before and after this sentence?
Ask kids to share new vocabulary words and figures of speech they come across. Help them define the words and use them in context.
Talk about why it's important to learn new vocabulary. How does it help to know lots of words?
App details
- Device: iPad
- Subjects: Language & Reading: letter or word recognition, reading comprehension, text analysis, vocabulary
- Skills: Thinking & Reasoning: problem solving, solving puzzles, thinking critically
Creativity: combining knowledge, making new creations - Price: Free to try
- Pricing structure: Free to try ($4.99/month or $49.99/year for a game bundle)
- Release date: September 8, 2017
- Category: Educational Games
- Size: 310.70 MB
- Publisher: Touch Press
- Version: 1.2.0
- Minimum software requirements: iOS 10.0 or later
- Last updated: June 23, 2019
Our editors recommend
For kids who love word games
Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.