Endless Alphabet

This app drives me crazy. It has recently become my two-year-old's go-to app; it wins awards left and right; and friends recommend it to me all the time. And yet, from a literacy point of view, it's pretty terrible. There is so much to like about it, that I feel bad criticizing the flaws in the literacy learning. When I talk to other friends with two-year-olds who adore Endless Alphabet as much as my daughter does, it feels like splitting hairs to point out that in many instances the letters make sounds they don't actually make in the context of that word. Or that "gargantuan" is a ridiculous vocabulary word for our toddlers to be practicing. Because what does it matter, really, when we've found an app that holds the two-year-olds' attention spans for longer than five minutes at a stretch? And one that encourages the kids to practice letter names and learn new words at the same time? It's gold... right?

Endless Alphabet opens with a parade of adorable monsters playing musical instruments. You then choose from a variety of continuously-updated words and a monster scatters the letters from the word. Your job is to put the letters back into their proper place. As you drag each letter into place, the letter says its most common sound (although NOT necessarily the sound it makes within the word; for example, the letter e always says "eh," even though in reality it is silent in many of the words, such as "dye"). Once clicked into place, the letter says its name. Every time Autumn plays with this app she editorializes as well: /a/, /a/, /a/, A "... for Autumn!"  buh, buh, buh, B ".... for Brooklyn, and there are two of them!" " V ... Vivian starts with V. My friend, Vivian! She starts with V!"  

Please note that in the letter A example above, the word could have been "musician." Yes, Autumn has learned that the letter A is for Autumn. And the reading teacher in me cringes when she says, aa, aa, Autumn. But that part is not the app developers' fault; after all, they don't know my daughter's name. They do, however, know their own words. And the sound /a/ (as in "apple") is very hard to hear in the word "musician." If they had consulted a literacy expert in the development of this app, they would have been told that the letters should make the sounds that they make within the actual word. 

Another problem is the pronunciation of some of the sounds themselves. The first, most essential, rule in making a phonics app is to make sure that there is no distortion in the pronunciation of the stop sounds (letters like B and D, which have sounds you can only say quickly and then you have to stop. As opposed to M and N, which are continuants: you can say their sounds as long as you have the breath to hold it.) In Endless Alphabet, monster voices make all of the sounds. Which is cute, but the letter sounds come out in deep, guttural voices, sounding like "BUH, BUH, BUH." Worse, if you hold your finger down on the letter B, the "uh" sound gets stretched out even further, so that it sounds like "buuuuuuh." This is nothing like what the letter sounds like within the word: NIBUUUUUUHLE? 

After the word is built, the monsters return and act out the meaning of the word. Some of the words strike me as more interesting / appropriate than others for the youngest learners, in terms of the vocabulary learning that toddlers should be doing, but Autumn's decision-making process is always inscrutable.

The companion app to Endless Alphabet is Endless Reader. That one looks and feels almost exactly the same as Endless ABC (and is made by the same folks), but the words are smaller. Some recent words I saw include "ball," "cake" and "eat," and they get used in a sentence during the definition portion. Originator calls these words "sight words," even though they are phonetically regular, and clearly thinks that they are teaching kids to read with this app. Of course, this app has all the same problems outlined above (the A in "eat" does not make an /a/ sound!) They have recently started charging for many of the words in the app, and I say good riddance to those words. My kids know they are not allowed to touch anything with a lock on it. These apps have so much potential. It is a pity that they did not consult with a literacy expert.

It is probably worth noting here that I am the only person on the Internet critizing these apps. Do a quick Google search of the reviews of Endless Alphabet and you will see only raves... "Wit and whimsy," "charming," and "surprisingly sophisticated" are just some of the words that pop up. And everyone's kids are apparently addicted. Resistance is futile. Those darn monsters are just too cute.