Ooka Island Review

Our educational philosophy around here does lean toward the Classical side, so we tend to use books versus electronics in our daily learning.  But we are not archaic, and we certainly use today's technology to assist us in our homeschooling journey.  We've used several internet based programs to assist with math and reading in the past, but recently I received Ooka Island as part of the Mosaic Review team.  I was excited to get this as Max is an emergent reader, so I thought he would enjoy this as a extra bit of fun in his day.



Never heard of Ooka Island?  Here's a bit about what Ooka Island is all about, straight from their site:

"Ooka Island’s Learn-to-Read System for children ages 3-7 will ensure skill mastery in the five pillars of reading instruction: phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension. Ooka Island is a revolutionary reading platform for PC and Mac that tutors your child through a compelling, yet robust curriculum and adapts to his or her strengths and weaknesses as they move along the path to fluent reading."

The game is a downloadable hero mission, taking the player through a series of games. Each game level builds on information the child learned in the prior level.   The prize at the end of each level is finding a book that the child can read.  My son looked forward to finding the book and reading it out loud to me.  The graphics are bold and vibrant, and the characters are interactive and engaging.

Alphabet Island has been a big hit with my son because there are activities such as rock climbing and skateboarding down the mountain. There are a bunch of other fun areas for them to explore such as Cake Factory, Popcorn Library, Pencil Playground, and Word Ball.

Overall, I did think that Ooka Island was a great enhancement to our day, and did provide a boost in my son's reading progress.

Hop on over to Ooka Island to see more on what they offer, and their affordable pricing.  They even offer a 14 day free trial!!