Game: First Words for Baby & Toddler
Genre: Education
System: IOS (Also on Google Play)
Developer|Publisher: Wienelware
Age Rating: EU 7+ | US Everyone
Price: UK free or £4.99 to unlock everything
Release Date: August 4th, 2023
Review code provided with many thanks to Wienelware.
Made By A Loving Mother
Here at LadiesGamers, we do like to do things a little differently from time to time compared to other gaming-centric websites. First Words for Baby & Toddler is a game developed for mums and babies by a Mummy. Yes, it’s suited to Daddy’s, too.
First Words for Baby & Toddler is designed to be shared with children aged 1-5 and helps build their vocabulary with the choice of interactive pictures. I myself have a young boy who does nothing but make me smile and keep me from getting a decent night’s sleep, so I was quite keen to try this with the little sprog and see what he thought of it. If you’re looking for an affordable app to share with the younglings and assist with their learning, this may be for you.
Pick A Card
Essentially, First Words for Baby & Toddler is a series of cue cards of various pictures separated into various categories. This includes animals, food, vehicles and many more. Each card is presented with a vibrant and well-drawn image which can be interacted with. Each image will animate very differently from the last, making exploring each one a fun experience for the little one. For example, tap on the lion image, and the lion will open his mouth. My son is a huge fan of lions, so we played a game where I pretended the lion was eating my finger. He seemed to get a lot of laughs out of my potential pain.
Other examples include drawing a path for an aeroplane and then watching the plane fly around the route you just made. He was also very fond of all of the musical instruments, such as the guitar, which can be strummed and the drum kit, which can be individually touched. He was very taken with the colourful pictures and the positive vibes expressed by them.
If you’re feeling really creative as a parent, you can string the cards together to form a story. The entire app is easy to use and family-friendly. I tended to flip through the cards myself and let my son poke about the pictures as we paused to discuss each one.
Niggles
There is not much to criticize, but I found a few nitpicks. I wasn’t fond of the English female voice which recited each image on the screen when presented. The voice just sounded artificial and lacked any excited emotion. It would have been handy just to mute this in an option setting so I could just do it myself, but instead, I just spoke over the voiceover.
A small performance niggle I had was when swiping to another card on an iPhone. It sometimes went to my iPhone options instead. It would have been handy to make this area a little bigger. A final nitpick is some cards feel a little complex for kids. For instance, the Dachshund card, which is a breed of dog (like a sausage dog). The dog is a general card in the app anyway, but this one left my son confused. But who knows, maybe it will click later.
Conclusion: Learning Experience
First Words for Baby & Toddler is a lovely interactive card game to share with the little ones (under 5), especially if you’re looking to help them with their vocabulary. I found this was best enjoyed in small 5-minute sessions, particularly when you, as the parent, have the energy to really get stuck into the experience. This is not something I recommend leaving alone with your child.
From my son’s perspective, he really liked the noises the cards made. Also, the ability to interact with each image, or at least watch me do. It’s a little too early to tell if it actually helped with his vocabulary, but we’ll see. At the end of the day, it gets a ‘roar!’ from my son (which means he likes it); therefore, it gets a solid recommendation from me. I don’t consider this a replacement for other forms of vocabulary learning, but it’s one to add to the toolbox.
Final Verdict: I Like it
The app can be downloaded for free on IOS or Android, where you have one category of cards to play with. For a small fee, you can unlock the full set.