Alien Buddies by Artgig Studio is a great app for preschoolers who will love the fun graphics and games yet learn so much while playing it. There are matching, puzzle and dot-to-dot games which teach colours, letters and numbers along with developing fine motor skills and logic and a sticker game where your child can get creative creating fantastic pictures. The cute little aliens and bright graphics are sure to appeal to all kids.
Where you load the app there are four options to choose from which are are as follows:
Match, first you choose from matching colours, shapes, letters and numbers that are displayed or spoken. A line of aliens appear on screen with letters, colours or shapes on their tummies and you have to drag the matching alien to the spaceship which is waiting below with colour, shape, letter or number displayed. The aim of the game is to match all ten aliens to their correct space ship, after which you earn a sticker.
Matching letters
Puzzle is a jigsaw like puzzle game where you can select from images of aliens and the difficulty level you wish to play which is either four, six or eight puzzle pieces. On completing the puzzle you earn stickers.
Puzzle game (6 pieces)
Dot-to-dot, first select whether you wish to have on screen prompts by selecting "Please Help" or not by selecting "I can do it myself". Then select from a choice of pictures you wish to create. You then need to join the dots from 1 to 2 to 3... and so on until your picture is complete. You earn stickers on completing the picture.
Dot-to-dot game
Stickers, select from a choice of backgrounds and add the stickers you have earned while playing the other games.
Stickers fun!
Ben loves playing Alien Buddies, I have had it installed on my iPad for awhile and I have noticed that it is one of those apps that he keeps coming back to again and again. He loves the little alien characters and the games are so fun and engaging that he plays them over and over again. He has gotten really fast at the matching game and the dot-to-dot game in particular which he now whizzes from one number to the next until complete. I like watching him getting creative and putting the stickers together to make some very cool pictures which we then have the option of saving a picture of. This is a great app to develop so many areas from number, shape and letter recognition both visually and aurally, to improving fine motor skills through the interactive features which require lots of dragging and dropping items on screen not to mention the creativity it sparks while creating pictures in the Stickers mode.
Ben enjoying playing dot-to-dot
Alien Buddies is available to download from the App Store for £1.49 and is compatible with both iPad and iPhone. This is definitely an app that your child will want to play again and again, and while doing so they will learn so much which is why I highly recommend getting hold of a copy.
