ABC mouse

[happycc]

I started my son who is 4.5 yrs on ABC mouse last month out of desperation to get him off of watching Spiderman on youtube. My son has a mild form of autism and has slight delays in fine motor skills and speech and with pretend play. 

My son is now no longer watching Spiderman every single day. Prior to that he would have an hour or two screaming fit when I said no. 

 

Since we started on ABC mouse....his vocabulary improved, he has learned more colors, he knows his numbers and letter much better than when I was torturing him with All About reading prek and Rightstart A. He is really good at maneuvering himself around the page with the different icons. He went from level 1 to level 2 in a month. 

 

Holding a pencil and crayon is hard for him and his coloring has been scribbling and no way being able to stay in the lines. WIth ABC mouse, he has to control his movements on the mouse to color the picture on the screen. I have seen an improvement in general coloring on paper since he started ABC mouse. 

 

Finally he is able to problem solve and plan ahead. There is a a lot of learning going on in these areas believe it or not. The area where most parents don't like: avatar, decorating room, buying accessories for animals, taking care of pets. My son is learning to think about the choices he makes and how it effects the environment or in this case the aesthetics of the room or aquarium. 

 

Also it is a safe place where he can experiment with different "looks" and he has control over his own space without me or his sisters to telling him clean it up or organize it. And that is a powerful feeling for him. 

 

 

He got a tree house bed and it didn;t fit into his virtual room. He decided to put it virtual outside. It was a great idea in my opinion. 

 

It takes some amount of planning to purchase an animal: do they have enough money, how much more do they need, what do they need to do to make that ticket amount, they do really want that animal, do they already have that animal, why would they want that animal again 

 

The hamster maze activity takes some thought too: does the maze work, takes some eye hand coodination to set it up, some visual perceptual stuff, my son started talking about the different compartments he designed for his hamster...this is where they sleep, where they eat and drink, where they defecate etc. That is some design and engineering skills developing. 

 

In the real world, I am seeing some of this transfer into his play. He was experimenting with our indoor slide and was trying different blankets and pillows to see which one made him slide faster. Then he put the indoor trampoline near the slide and tried to jump off of the slide onto the trampoline and he thought that was hilarious as he flew higher than before. Then he thought about putting a pillow down in front of the trampoline to protect his fall. 

 

He lives watching the bus fly up the pole and see his progress. We do bribe him that when he finishes a level he gets a treat. That keeps him focused on the path. I like that it read stories to them and the pages turns and the words are highlighted. I am unable to read to him as much as I would like as I am busy teaching the older ones and chasing the younger one. 

 

Prior to ABC he was just hyperfocused on all things Spider. Now I am see greater interests in other areas as well as development in other areas as well. I am glad I made the purchase. 

[shawthorne44]

DD likes it and I like it too.  

One thing that drove me nuts was that if she did a lesson but it wasn't through the learning path, it still wanted your kid to do it again.  There was a couple of months where she refused to use the learning path because it wanted her to color something she already colored.  I ended up just doing the darn thing to get past it.  Then the little stinker noticed the picture in the classroom and was upset because they posted someone else's work.  

 

I like that it got across the idea that coloring inside the lines is a possible goal.  

 

I wish that it was possible to disallow certain levels.  Like the ones that require reading a sentence and then matching up the puzzles.  One is abut two bugs.  

 

I also wish it was possible to disallow level 1 of puzzles.  She can do puzzles.  She did a 150 puzzle with her Gram.  But she likes to watch the pieces fly.  

 

Have you seen the one where the chickens lay eggs and then the child counts the eggs?  The chickens go through these funny contortions while laying the eggs.  

 

I could really do without the tickets.  She just buys random stuff until it tells her she doesn't have enough money.  

 

The hamster maze is pretty neat.  She used to go down the wrong path on purpose.  But, she stopped when I pointed out that her hamster was in danger.  

 

That 3D shapes maze is pretty neat too.  

[QuirkyKapers]

This wasn't around when my kids would have been interested in this.  I have heard great things about ABC mouse from anyone who has used it!

[Hypatia.]

We just started the 30 day free trial.  Both my 3 year old and my 5 year old enjoyed playing on it today, I'll see how it holds their attention over the next few weeks.  

[happycc]

My son doesnt seem to mind coloring the same things over and over again. 
He hasn;t realized that he gets the same pictures to color again. 

He doesn;t like the puzzle when it gets harder. In level one, he only chose level 1 and that just required him to click it and that was it. I wish they would disable that and allow me to control it at the parent level so I control the level and he has to do the level he really should be doing. 

I don;t pay attention to too much as I am so busy teaching the others. I am just glad he isn;t pushing his baby brother around or flooding the bathroom. 

 

I do love how ABC make you type in a password to print. I would be out of paper by now! 

 

I think the tickets is a good thing. It helps him figure out how much tickets he needs to buy something he wants. He is learning how to read numbers and watching the number go up with each activity he does. Cause and effect. 

 

Haven;t seen any sentence reading yet or at least I haven;t heard him whining or moaning about it yet. 

 

Anyways we have him on Clever Dragons now and he likes it but it is much harder and requires one of us to walk him through the work a bit and read things out loud. I got sick of seeing him only doing ABC Mouse all the time, so I got him Clever Dragons. 

I also have him on Science 4US but it is not his favorite---no avatars to decorate I believe is the reason. 

 

 

[Walking-Iris]

My oldest has Asperger's and when he was little he hyperfocused (still hyper focuses actually) on various things. My advice from someone who's btdt---you're on the right track limiting the television. I think kids with autism get lost in screens easier than other children. Really lost.

 

My oldest loved to learn on the computer as well, BUT relax your vigil for a minute and some website becomes a full blown obsession.

 

 

I've always found there's a real balancing act between allowing screen times, and making sure children (especially children on the spectrum) don't get lost to it.

 

I notice that it will take my ds ...still...an hour or two of stimming type repetitive behaviors after watching or using a screen to process it all.

 

Starfall is free. It may help with the reading aspect.

 

 

[happycc]

Some things I keep on hand to keep him from hyperfocusing on screen time....

 

an indoor slide

an indoor and outdoor trampoline

a garden 

kinetic sand in a box with a box of toys-sensory box

water and cups (water play)

dressups/blocks/legos

tons of books

coloring/art stuff always available

baking gluten free/casein free foods

 

going to get some chicks and duckings

chinchillas

fishes

snake

 

Lots of field trips, gymnastics, piano, park days, his speech therapy

 

We cycle through all this as much as possible to keep him off the screen as little as possible.