J Is For Jag

$3.99, iPad (339 MB)

Teaches: early reading, alphabet, the letter J

CTR Rating: 82%

CTR Review

Part of a planned letter-themed series of reading apps (one per letter), J is for Jag is nicely narrated and illustrated, and it is easy to jump around from one page to another in the story. It does a nice job "over learning" a single letter by repeating the sound in the context of different words and illustrations. In the story, Jag Jaguar is trying to practice playing the Jingle Bells for the upcoming Jungle Jamboree, but his nighttime practicing is upsetting the tired animals. As you can see, some of the "J" words (like Jingle Bells) seem contrived, which reduces the chances the experience will have meaning for some children. In addition, the animated features have a "sprinkled" feel to them -- in other words, while they increase a child's feelings of control, they don't always support the story. There are two modes ("Read to me" or "I'll read it"), or a child can record the narration. Each story in the series will contain 20-25 screens. The menu and the last pages of the story contain links to social media and web pages within the child's area of the app and it is not possible to control the sound.