educational computer games for a five-yr-old?

[Lorien]

Can anyone suggest some good educational computer games for a 5-yr-old?

Thanks, Lorien

Hi Lorien - my ds has also enjoyed the "Jump Ahead" series. He also likes the Reader Rabbit CDs. My favorite CDs are the ones produced by Dorland Kindersley. DS likes to play with all these CDs, but his favourite games aren't educational at all!! He likes Crash Bandicoot on the playstation or gameboy

We have a few DK Learning Ladder CDs which are an excellent combination of learning and education. There are lots of exercises for which you get stickers when completed and then there is a on screen sticker album to fill in. We have 3-5, 5-7 and 7-8 years, which tie in with nursery/reception class, Year 1-2 and Year 3 at school. PC World often have them on BOGOF too.

I also like the BBC children's software eg. Bob the Builder and though these aren't necessarily educational they do help children to gain computer skills.

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Peter Rabbit's Number game - my 8 year still enjoys playing it! and dh only bought it for a tenner

maryz - my soon to be 5yr old ds has been playing 'Oz' since Christmas ... and if I hear him say "I'm meltinnnnng" one more time he will be the one with a bucket of water on his head

It depends what you mean by educational. If you want to expand knowledge, any of the Magic Schoolbus ones are brilliant - your child will just absorb so much information about all kinds of science and have a lot of fun as well. Nice little games as well - I love the sandcastle building one on the Ocean disc, where all of a sudden you notice little people peeking out of the sandcastles. Also the one with the penguin jumping from ice floe to ice floe is good. My boys have picke dup an encyclpaedic knowledge from these.

I'd also recommend the Playmobil games as games suitable for kids, but exciting. There is one about a farm called Alex (I think), another one called Laura about adventures in a pink girly setting, and the one that we've got, called Hype, which is about knights and dragons (for 7-10)which my two boys absolutely love. They are selling now for only 9.99 in places like Smiths - judging from Hype I would really recommend them for HOURS and HOURS of real fun. They use the arrow keys rather than a mouse, which seems a bit awkward at first, but my boys soon got used to that.