The Lorax. Celebrating Earth day, Oceanhouse Media has released the Lorax. Illustrations are panned in and out of the book. Read to me, Read to myself, and Autoplay. Text font is very small but readable. Text is highlighted as read. Read aloud is a storyteller voice. The Onceler voice should have been much more crusty and cranky. Light sound effects. Animation is words and sound appearing when objects or text are touched. This is their usual handling of Seuss books. I would like to see Oceanhouse pushing the envelope. Well done as far as it goes, but not remarkable. Expensive. Published by Oceanhouse Media. $3.99. (aa)

Lorax Garden. Not sure what they were going for here. It's a flower growing garden game. Few instructions and it's not intuitive. Water the garden, watch the flower grow, and pull out the weeds. I had high hopes for this game. It should be a fun app, but it is not. I suspect the game is supposed to go along with the reading of the Lorax, but very young children usually don't get the Lorax. The game is designed with very little to do. The idea is good, but just not done well. It feels like they tried to hurry the production of the game to be out with the release of the ipad and missed the mark. Published by Oceanhouse Media. $2.99. (BB)

Fables are very old tales going back centuries. They usually are very short and have specific point or moral on behavior. Often young children don't really understand them if they are not explained or discussed. Animals are usually the characters. The animals are not personalized. The wolf in The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing is not named, Tom. However, the animals do exhibit limited human behavior. Aesop's Fables are the most famous, but there are fables from many countries. In book format it's often the illustrations that really enchant children. For example, the illustrations in Jerry Pinkney's Aesop's Fables picture book are beautifully drawn with watercolor and colored pencil. There are 61 fables in the book with text which is a bit much for the very young. However, in Pinkney's Lion and the Mouse there is just one story with very limited text. The stunning detail in the animals facial expressions are one of the reasons this was a Caldecott Medal winner. Pinkney is an amazingly talented African American artist. To do this format justice, iphone or ipad apps need to be have charming illustrations. I will be looking at fable apps for a few days. If I can't find significantly fabulous apps, then go to Amazon.com and get a couple of Pinkney's books for your child. Don't settle for a weak app. Everytime you reread Pinkney's books you will see something new and beautiful that you did not previously notice. Look at this face...

There are numerous collections of Aesop's Fables, such as SmilingMobile Inc's, Aesop Fables! for $0.99. However these collections are not individual books on one fable. These are available for those adults and older students who may be studying fables. Most are not illustrated collections, but some have one illustration per fable. There are also audio iphone fable collections with audio only. Preparing an app for fables is challenging. Even though the story is short, the same amount of thought should go into a presenting a fable as with any other story. It's not easy to be awesome on a fable. Below are a some individual fables for the young child.

The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Music on cover only. Read aloud and Read to myself. Light animation. Text large enough to read easily but not highlighted as read. Illustrations in an acceptable but not lavish folk art style. Good Wolf. Touch control of boy and animal voices with just enough variety to make it almost awesome. Good voice over by child. Moral is at the end of the story. Published by Kidzstory an imprint of Stepworks Company. $0.99. (aa)


The Tortoise and the Hare. Read aloud and read to myself. Music on introduction. Animation adequate. Text large and easy to read, but not highlighted as read. The illustrations do not have an earthy quality. Animals much too cartoon like, including the touch control animal voices. The giggling of the hare is obnoxious. Same child voice as above, but this has a slight sing song pattern that is not appealing for a fable. Moral at the end of the story. Published by Kidzstory an imprint of Stepworks Company. $0.99 (BB)

The Tortoise and the Hare. Cartoon version of the story. Illustrations disappointing. Auto read only. Text too small. No read by myself. Words are not highlighted as read. A short story made long. Some animation but it doesn't significantly add to the story. The reading sounded like it was recorded in a basement. This was 5 star rated. No Way! Published by Storyboy. $0.99. (BB)

The Lion and the Mouse. Read to me and a read to myself. In English and Cantonese. Cartoon illustrations. Ugliest lion I have ever seen. Text is highlighted, but not as read and is too small. Child readers. No animation. No sound except for readers. This app exhibits absolutely no charm. Published by iReading an imprint of AppleTree. $0.99. (BB)


The Lion and the Mouse. Music on intro only. Read to me and a read to myself. Text not highlighted, but large enough to read easily. Illustrations are average but just a little too cartoony, for example, the mouse has on a dress. Child reader. The reading is in a slight sing song pattern and doesn't quite fit. Animation not spectacular. When animals are touched there is squeaking and roaring. By the end of the story the reader has had an overdose of the same squeaking and roaring. Published by Kidztory an imprint of Stepworks. $0.99. (BB)

The Tale of Peter Rabbit Children's Book by Beatrix Potter. No music. No Animation. Has choice of read to myself or auto read. Looks like they just photocopied the book and made it into the app. Print is too small. Pictures should be larger. Text is not highlighted as read. Pages are hard to turn as the page turner is very tiny at the very bottom corner and tricky to use. Save your money. Published by Touch Tales. $0.99. (BB)

Peter Rabbit - Touch Play. The actual Beatrix Potter tale with the beautiful illustrations. Print is large enough to read. Can auto read or read to myself by turning off sound. Illustrations have touch points where the characters talk and the words they speak are readable. Text is not highlighted as read but very faintly highlighted for easy reading. The readers voice is lilting and charming. Easy slide page turn. The birds sing. Hear Peter chewing and even when he has a tummy ache. Go to a scene, add characters, and email or save the page. A lovely fun app. AWESOME but expensive. By SnackLogic Studios $3.99. (A)

The Tale of Peter Rabbit Illustrated Story with music. A read aloud only. No text. Illustration are average. Similar to Beatrix Potter but a not so charming copy. As each page is finished being read then it automatically colors it. It has a puzzle story. The puzzle page is difficult. You are asked to find something on each page and it's difficult for an adult to find. When it's found the page is colored. The concept is good, but the production process misses the mark. Published by Once Upon an App. $0.99. (BB)

The Three Little Pigs is a classic fairy tale which should have an outstanding version for the iphone. Hold the iphone... Not so easy to find. I did find one version that is very good. Let's look at the ones that missed the mark first. Some of these are rated with 4 stars at the Applestore. Must be all their friends and families. Classic Three Little Pigs is reviewed in the Preschool column and is a Buyer Beware.

Three Little Pigs by Storyboy. Only an autoread. No read by myself section. The illustrations are very cartoon like. The pigs barely look like pigs although the wolf is very good. The pigs are friends not brothers. The text is large enough to be readable, but is not highlighted as read. The wolf is blowing the house but no huffing and puffing. How can there be a 3 pigs story without huffing and puffing? The wolf falls into the soup. The pigs pulls out the wolf, fix his sore bottom, and he promises not to eat meat. Yikes! The story is an abomination. No animation, no music and not worth the $0.99. (BB)

Three Little Pigs: Level F leveled Reader by Language Technology Inc. Level F is supposedly 1st grade. There is only a read to myself level. No auto read. No music. No animation. Very simplified version. At the end has questions about the main idea, compare and contrast, and analyze, etc. Have to go page by page to get back to the story, no back to home. Illustrations are ordinary. The only good thing is the cost. $free... Maybe a home school family might use it. No real literary value. (BB)

The Three Little Pigs by iReading2. Evidently the parent company is Appletree Books. Has an auto read, a read to myself, and a bookshelf for other books by the same company. If by chance you would want to waste your money on more of these. In English and Chinese. The text is very small and difficult for a child to see. This is a politically correct 3 pigs. There is little black pig, little white pig, and I would guess a gay pig named Little Flower who is the eldest brother, shades of Andrew Lang's version. The illustrations do not match the story. There is no black pig or white pig. The illustrations show a brown pig and two pink pigs. There is a forest of candy trees instead of apple trees. Joseph Jacobs must be turning over in his grave. There is huffing and puffing in the animation, but the words huff and puff do not appear in the text. The text says "evil" wolf too many times. Actually the word is not necessary. The pigs crying is obnoxious. The wolf sounds like a dog. $0.99. (BB)

The Winner

The Three Little Pigs by Kidztory. If it had the part about the apples and the fair, it would be perfect, but it's almost awesome. Music on intro only. Auto read and read by myself. Charming read aloud by a child. Text is large enough for kids to read, but not highlighted as read. Plays with the theme a little by saying mom told them to do their best when she actually sent them out to seek their fortune. Pigs not too cartoon like. Has the huff and puff in the text and even the "Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin" which is in none of the above versions. The teeth chattering of the scared pigs adds to the story. Animation and sound effects are good as the wolf huffs and puffs and blows the houses down, licks his lips in anticipation of a pig dinner, and runs out of the house with his tail on fire. Just misses overkill on pig grunting. $0.99. (aa)

Lots of Good Fun


CatCamgram and GrinchBobcat

Dr. Seuss iPhone apps
As of March 8th Sale Extended for an Unknown time
$0.99 to $1.99

Oceanhouse media in honor of Dr. Seuss's birthday and NEA,s Read Across America is giving you a chance to get the awesome Dr. Seuss apps at the fraction of the regular cost. The regular price runs between $2.99 to $3.99. The photos above come from the Dr. Seuss Camera - Cat Cam Edition and Grinch edition. For more information about all the Dr. Seuss apps checkout www.oceanhousemedia.com/drseuss

Check your apps on your iphone to see if sale still applies.

How to decide which apps are worth the space on the iphone? We can only have 12 pages of apps. When you get to page 11 you start freaking out about app space. The Lego app here is a fun little app. It has a camera and you can bring in a photo. It turns that photo into a nifty little Lego picture in a few seconds. It choses a variety of colors and the user cannot actually move the bricks around. Where is the creativity here? So the dilemma becomes when your app space gets crowded, "Do I keep this app, or chuck it". There are plenty of other camera apps, so what do you do?

This is also a problem when it comes to books or graphic novels sold by each chapter. Each chapter puts an icon on your app page. You could have 6 or 7 icons for one book eating up your app space. Uclick sells most comics, but not all, by the chapter. Lots of icons for you. IVerse Media sells each comic and places it within one icon. A lot depends on your own needs.

Are you choosing apps for educational purposes? If so, look for an app that goes beyond what can be done with paper and pencil. Flash cards on apps. Yikes, no thanks. Find an app that uses the media to make that application fresh, full of wonder, and fun. Get kids interested in the world around them with exciting apps. Deliver a 21st century education. Choose your apps for kids wisely and save your app space for the great apps. Right now some companies are trying to use their old formats to make iphone apps, but they won't get away with that for long. World wide competition is getting too stiff. As the technology improves, the apps will become more awesome.

By just looking at the publisher, you cannot tell the quality of the book. For example, iStoryTime has a variety of book apps available. Some are classics and some are original works. I found the Reading Bug to be a lovely original work. However, their version of Little Red Riding Hood is lamentable. The illustrations are unremarkable. The words are not highlighted with the narration. The story varies from the original with too much unnecessary conversation. They have other classic tales also on the loose in the app store.

The Wiener Dog and the Brave Monkey are both original works published by iStoryTime and have little substance in the story, illustrations, or narration. Frogdogmedia is the parent company of iStoryTime.

The criteria for iPhone books is the same as print books in some ways. A good story is a good story. If the story is a classic, is it dumbed down? Has conversation been added to the story that doesn't fit? It can have a modern twist, but it should enhance the story, either with humor or interesting illustrations, hopefully both. The illustrations should always match the writing on each page.

Audio books, CD's, iPhone, and internet stories have additional criteria. If the story has some sound or music it should not distract from the story. If the story is animated the animation should not be overwhelming. The stories should always have a read to me and a read to myself section that can be turned off and on. In the read to me section it's a plus if words are highlighted as they are read. The story should have carefully crafted illustrations. If it's a classic with a classic illustrations by the author, those illustrations need to be there. The example used here of The Little Red Hen uses beautifully constructed illustrations with a folk art theme. The narration, read by a child, has given the Little Red Hen a clear sparkling voice. In this book the narrator misreads one word on the first page and the words are not highlighted as they are read. However, it does not affect the charm of the narration. The reader can choose narration in either English, Spanish, and Chinese (Cantonese). When looking for the app on your iphone search by Kidzstory although Stepworks is listed as the publisher. Kidzstory also has The Tortoise and the Hare and The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Kidzstory is probably an imprint of the parent company.

After seeing my grandchildren playing with selected iPhone apps, I knew the iphone was not just for adults. I started to put the apps on my graphic novel blog when I realized as time progresses there will thousands of new apps in the next few years, not only for the iPhone, but also the ipad, therefore, a new blog is born.

Some might say children have no business with an iPhone. Put the parental controls on it. Make rules such as sit while using it. Stay in the location where they are using it. Keep an eye on them. In all families situations occur where the kids are going nuts and you need something to keep one of them from freaking out. For us, on a car trip one child upchucked. We needed something to distract the other child from doing the same while we did cleanup. The iPhone did the job. If you have an iPhone, you might as well use it to your advantage.