How educational are the “educational” programs

Kids do learn from using computer games. This does not make those games educational programs. To be educational, a program must teach something that somebody planned to teach. In the jargon of the schools, that is called a learning objective.

Further, to be educational, a program must show somehow that the kid has learned that objective. In a game, that’s easy. You can see how well the player does . . . how many aliens were stopped or how many dots, dashes or stars eaten.

Games also have, built-in, the thing teachers call “motivation.” That is, kids want to do it.

Putting these elements together, we see that an educational program should have a specific goal, should motivate the child to do the work well, and have a testing system built into it. With all this in mind, we looked at five different educa¬ tional programs available for the T/S IOOO/ZX81.

Mindware’s Multiple Choice program begins with clear screen information and instructions, and guides the student very well through each stage. Basically, this program is a set of questions ranging from, “What is the capital of New York state?” to “What is the square root of 2?”

What the test does, it does okay. It does not meet our simple requirements, though, to really classify as an educational program. It does not hone in on specific learning objectives. It does not teach anything. It does give a general information test.

The more important part of this program is its ability to let you (student, parent, or teacher) create your own test. You put the problems and answers into the program. Multiple Choice leads you clearly and easily through that process. In this mode, the program accepts questions and answers of up to 32 characters each. After you have created your test, you can save it for later use. Thus you (teacher, student or parent) can create a file of tests on different subjects and of varying difficulty.

Another program that lets you create, save and re-use your own tests is called Flashcard. A flashcard is a device used in many classrooms. It has a problem or question on one side and a solution or answer on the other. On the T/S1000/ZX81 version, you put problems on as many as 100 cards, and answers which are then mixed by the computer and presented to the learner in one of two ways: randomly with repeats for a set number of cards; or randomly with no repeats, but using all the cards. At the end of either test, your score is presented.

Both Flashcard and Multiple Choice let you put what you want into a good drill, review or test of that information. Neither one teaches, but either could form the basis of good trivia games. Softsync has a series called Computer Tutor, We looked at two in the series, Math Raiders and Alpha/Vowel Tutor. I would have felt better if the word “tutor” had not been used; it is defined in the dictionary as “teacher,” but these programs do not teach. They do tell you if you are right or wrong and they do give you the right answers, but is that really teaching? We don’t think so!

In Math Raiders, the game concept has been well used to motivate the child. The student uses his math skills to ward off the landing of an alien form. Each weapon (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) has two levels of difficulty. For fun, these programs rate high. For educational content, they rate low. They include too many different types of problems with too wide a skill range. They lack a logical progression in problem presentation.

Timex’s education program A tor, the ABC Gator, is extremely well done. It has eye-catching, high-interest graphics, great pacing and sound . . . that’s right, sound in a T/S1000/ZX81 program. You or the child synchronize the tape through a simple but very effective countdown. The child hears original music and great instructions while working the computer. This combination of computer and tape recorder produces a fine educational package.

The one fly-in-the-ointment in this package is the language used on the screen. A child learning the ABC s certainly cannot read the in¬ structions, A notice should be printed on the instruction sheet that an adult or a reader will be needed to help the child use this program effectively,

Reston Publishing is the first to launch a full-fledged educational math program for the T/S1000/ZX81. It breaks the math lessons into six sets, one for each grade from one to six. In each set there are 32 separate lessons; each introduces a problem, shows how to solve it, then drills and tests the student. They are total lessons based on sound classroom techniques. More important, there is a workbook for each set. After the student does a computer lesson, he or she completes a pencil and paper test of the skill in the workbook. The main drawback to the Reston program is the price. Each set (two cassette tapes, 32 lessons, a 64-page workbook and a vinyl binder storage case) costs $29.95.

All in all, we were really disappointed with the programs that purport to be educational. For the T/S1000/ZX81 we recommend only the Timex and Reston materials.