Parents' Guide to

Learn Science

By Chad Sapieha, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 6+

Below-average educational game for a narrow audience.

Game Nintendo DS , Nintendo DSi 2011
Learn Science Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this game.

  • Learn Science Game: Screenshot #1
  • Learn Science Game: Screenshot #2
  • Learn Science Game: Screenshot #3

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What’s It About?

LEARN SCIENCE provides a variety of educational games and activities in five categories: physics, colors and sounds, the human body, biology, and geography. Examples include arranging organs in a human body, directing laser lights around a stage with mirrors, and guiding a falling ball into a basket by setting up platforms and pegs. Players can choose to try these games individually or work through a “career” mode, which sees them trying a handful of new games each day. Performance statistics are kept for both individual games and the career mode. A third mode dubbed “TV Quiz” has players answering a short series of science-themed trivia questions. Regardless of mode, players can choose from three difficulty levels that are meant to roughly correlate to grades one through four.

Is It Any Good?

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

There’s no getting around this game’s mediocre production values. Text errors are especially egregious. Players can expect to encounter some strange phrasing and typos, such as a trivia question and its corresponding answers worded and punctuated as follows: “When crickets rub their wings? They?re cold. They?re happy. They chirp.”

Most of the non-trivia challenges are short and have little replay value. A few activities -- such as one that involves filling beakers with different levels of water to alter their acoustic properties to match a given melody, and another that has players flipping switches in a tangle of wires to turn on the proper appliances -- are fun to play once or twice, but not more. It’s unlikely any kids who have experienced more compelling interactive entertainment will be interested in what’s on offer here for very long. There are many much better educational games.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about how science is used both in our casual lives and our careers. Can science be fun outside of a game? Do your teachers make science enjoyable in the class?

  • Ask kids what they learned from this game. Have you come away with a better sense of geography, how our bodies work, or how physical laws govern our world? Do you think there’s anything the game’s makers could have improved upon?

  • Do you like playing educational games? Do they help make the learning fun?

Game Details

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