Play and Learn with Wallace App {a review & giveaway}

My kids have a new favorite iPad app.

It’s called Play and Learn with Wallace.

You may recognize this cute little doggy from the Priddy Books. This is Wallace and he will take your child through an exciting new series of preschool apps from Priddy Books.

The app itself is free, but don’t let that fool you. Once you install the app you can’t do much of anything unless you purchase one or more of the in-game apps. There are currently 5 in-game apps to purchase for $0.99 each (this was the price at the time of this post). I believe they will be adding more in-game apps in the future and I’d imagine they would be the same price as the others.

The current apps available are Counting Fun, My First App, Picture Puzzles, Number Skills, and First Spelling. There is also a Super Shuffle app that unlocks once you purchase at least two of the other apps.

Your preschooler through first grader will work on reading skills, counting skills, problem solving, fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, and earn rewards as they go. You can play the app by subject or you can use the Super Shuffle app to combine skills from each of the apps you have purchased.

Counting Fun teaches counting skills as well as number and quantity recognition with the following 6 games – Animal Counting, Touch the Number, Counting Fruit, Toy Shelf, Matching Pairs, and Counting Vehicles.

My First App teaches first words, hand-eye coordination, visual tracking, number skills, and patterns with the following 6 games – Counting Ducks, Animal Sounds, Odd One Out, On Safari, Match the Pairs, and Color It.

Counting Ducks

On Safari

Picture Puzzles helps your child develop creative skills, test his visual sense, build spatial awareness with the following six games – Follow the Lines, Matching Twins, Noisy Zoo, Shadow Shapes, Spot the Dot, and Puzzle Pieces.

Number Skills uses simple activities to teach about adding and subtracting numbers between 1 and 10. The Number Skills app includes the following six games – Problem Train, Card Problems, Button Numbers, Raining Numbers, Bus Math, and Math Class.

First Spelling teaches early spelling and phonics using the following six games – Letter Match, Guess the Sound, Matching First Sounds, Missing Letters, Odd Word Out, and Spell the Word.

Guess the Sound

Play and Learn with Wallace allows the parent to track their child’s progress, rewards the child with stickers and certificates, and lets you try each app before you buy it.

My 2-year-old twins, and my 4 and 6-year-old daughters are all enjoying this new app. Whenever they are able to play the iPad, this is the game they have been playing. Usually when we get a new app, they play it for a day or two and then it is forgotten about. Or they will play an app and it will quickly loose their attention after only a few minutes. Well, Wallace has been hanging around for a week now and he holds their attention quite well.

The app is very easy to use, even for my 2-year-olds (they need a little help with the matching games, but that’s it). It offers great variety with all the different games available, so it holds the child’s attention. It does a terrific job of teaching the beginning skills of reading and counting, plus it’s fun and affordable – definitely worth the cost.

There were really only 2 things that I would change about this app – I wish you could create more player profiles. The app only allows you to create 2 profiles, and I have 4 kids playing it. Therefore I’m not able to take advantage of the feature that allows you to track your child’s progress. I also feel that it takes awhile for the child to earn the rewards. You need to earn 10 stickers to get a reward certificate and as you earn certificates you then begin to earn medals. To earn 10 stickers you need to play roughly 40 games consecutively in the same app. If you leave the app before you earn the 10 stickers, it starts you all over with no stickers when you return to the app. I think 40 games is a lot to play at one time in order to earn a certificate. Thankfully my kids don’t really mind much about the rewards.

Overall, we are really enjoying this app and I would highly recommend it for any family with preschool-aged kids up to first grade.

Now for the giveaway –

One reader will receive a $10 iTunes gift card to purchase the app, along with 3 Wallace storybooks for your bookshelf!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

You can check out this video and see the app in action:

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Play and Learn with Wallace App {a review & giveaway}

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Hi! I'm Sarah.