The iPad is as much a family staple these days as the pet dog, a fact that was reinforced recently by that viral video of a young boy trying to flick his way through a broadsheet newspaper. Given the prominence of the tablet, it makes sense that there’s some opportunity out there for educational apps to make their mark. We’ve seen a few of these come to the fore recently, but now German developer Linguino are entering the fray with their ‘Monsters Behave!’, a rhyming and word play app for iPad. Released in Germany last year to rave reviews, Linguino have spent the last twelve months redeveloping the little beast for the English speaking world. How does this new and improved version stack up?
Personally, I love the theme of this app. The mission statement is to inspire kids and get them to start looking at language in a new way. It does this through a very unique premise; kids can choose between eight little misbehaving monsters, all of them acting up at the dinner table. With Mother Monster being none too impressed at her offspring’s offensive table manners, it’s up to the child to play word games with the little monsters and slowly whip them into shape one by one. As well as the word play aspect, this clever approach works twofold; kids will recognise the monsters’ bad behaviour as similar to their own, and as they ‘teach’ them proper etiquette to progress the game, they’re also being taught themselves. Smart.
This would all be for nothing if the games weren’t fun and well-designed. Fortunately, they are both these things. For each little monster there’s a choice of three options, a rhyming game, a word puzzle game or a mini-game, the latter being unique to each monster. The rhyming games are very creative and stimulating, even humorous too; ‘with her jaw dropping down and her mouth like a cave, she spits out her food in wave after…(insert word)’. I’ll give you that one, it’s ‘wave’. The word puzzles provide you with a sentence full of blanks and a choice of possible words to fill them. The mini-games are just a bit of silly fun that the kids can play as a reward after the hard graft of rhyming and constructing is done and dusted.
All in all, this is an engaging, imaginative app that is educational in more ways than one as well as being buckets of fun (this rhyming thing isn’t so hard!). It focuses on an area of education that is often overlooked, and the approach is so dead on I can’t imagine a kid not enjoying this. It’s incredible value for money too. Playable at home with the family or at school with a class, Linguino have created a real winner with ‘Monsters Behave!’.
Monster mash your way to the links below to get your paws on ‘Monsters Behave!’
