Bottom Line: A must-have app for teachers and parents alike. Great graphics meet terrific game play, with a good deal of educational content included to boot. A price tage of $1.99 purchases content to keep early elementary users happy for quite some time.
If you'd like to download Dino Dog — A Digging Adventure with Dinosaurs! ($1.99, iPhone/iPad), use the link below to dig up some love for Smartappsforkids.com:
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You're going to fall in love (and your kids will too) with Dino Dog Doug and Bonnie the Bear in this dino-tastic app from developer Storytoys Entertainment Limited. Dinosaur lovers and non-lovers alike will love these lovely little characters and their quest for buried fossils.
When your preschool through early elementary-aged kiddo first opens the app, he or she is whisked off to Europe in search of buried fossils. By nature Dino Dog Doug is all kinds of excited to dig the whole day long, and Bonnie Bear is right behind him. The app opens inside a fancy dinosaur museum where your tot can choose from three worlds of digging fun, each with its own theme. Each world has four levels that increase in difficulty. Your kid's job is to guide Doug underground through mazes to collect all five fossils in each level. Along the way, he finds special objects and power-ups that enhance his journey.
After a level is complete your tiny user gets to crack open the fossils she collects, dust off the bones and then assemble them to create an entire dino skeleton. Once that is done, her dinosaur creation comes to life and is then placed inside a special area of the museum. Skeletons can be accessed at any time, and when they're viewed, Doug tells your rugrat all about the dinosaur he dug up. I love the specific mix of game play and education that the developers have created inside this app. Not only does Dino Doug offer a total of 12 levels of game play, but there is also a good amount of accurate information included. Even as Doug digs, he comments on the types of soil he is digging through. Dino related? No. Awesome information? Yes.
The graphics in this app are top-notch, and Doug and Bonnie are sweet little consistent characters. Each level is introduced with a short cartoon that combines with all the others to tell one big story. The humor had me, as well as the first grader I played with, giggling along. Sound and narration can be controlled from the museum main page — always a huge factor that I look for, especially in apps containing multiple levels.
If I had to change one thing about the app I would include different activities. There is so much content in this app, especially for the price, but the digging got a little monotonous for the little princess who helped me take this app out for a test spin. Other dinosaur-related games and activities would add a little more variety and make game interest last a little longer, especially for older users. That factor wasn't enough to dock my rating of this app, because the presence of power-ups and Doug's great sense of humor as he digs quickly make up for the repetition of the activity.
Every year in speech therapy I make sure to do a dinosaur-themed unit, and this app has already dug its way into my lesson plans. A healthy mix of fun, entertainment and education, especially at an awesome price, make this app a must-have for teachers and families alike.
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Rachel J. has a love/hate relationship with back-to-school shopping.
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