How Things Work in Busytown

$19.95, Windows CD-ROM, Mac CD-ROM

Teaches: following directions, sorting, matching, parts of the community

CTR Review

As they fly over Busytown in the "Applecopter," children use the mouse to select one of seven activities: Garbage Truck, Recycling Plant, Toy Factory, Assembly Plant, Road Construction Crew, Farm, and Bakery. There are two levels of play. In the easy level, children can freely visit any area of the program. Using the advanced setting (preset with an adult options menu), children can use a phone booth to call other parts of BusyTown as needed. For example, kids can place a call to summon a delivery truck to take grain from the farm to the bakery. In all, there is plenty for a child to do, and each of our testers seemed to find a favorite activity. In the Assembly Plant, children use a blueprint and the mouse to drag the parts of a garbage truck into place. They can drive the truck around the streets to collect trash, which is then sorted into plastic, paper, or metal at the Recycling Plant. After recycling, children can turn the garbage into toys at the Toy Factory by following step-by-step instructions. The program also contains six "follow the bouncing ball" musical arrangements based on the activities. We were impressed with how well the activities were integrated, the number of fun activities available, and the clear graphics and sounds. Test families reported that the cursor was somewhat difficult to get used to, as its placement on an object is inexact. (To select activities you drag the character to the machine or object that you want to use.) Families also felt that the level selection could have been more obvious after installation of the program. Although you are given a function key to select the difficulty level, instructions for its use are presented only during installation.