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Bailey's Book House
by Edmark

See also the Summary Rating Table for comparisons with other Early Learning software titles, and the SuperKids Buyers Guide for current market prices of PC and Mac versions.

Reviewed on:
PowerMac 6100/60 with 8MB and 2XCD,
Pentium90 with 8MB and a 2XCD

Bailey's Book House, a classic early learning title, was updated late in 1995. We wanted to see if it lived up to the heritage of its predecessor.

Content
Bailey's contains a collection of seven activities designed to introduce young learners to reading and writing. These activities include: a preposition exercise where the user gets to direct Houdini the dog and Edmo the clown to demonstrate the meaning of words like in, out, under, over, on and off; a letter machine that produces letters and words that start with them; and a rhyming game where the user fills in a missing rhyming word. Two new activities added in the updated version are an explore adjectives game where the user gets to describe the anatomical parts of a friend (curly hair, blue legs, straight arms, crooked nose, etc.), and an early reading exercise focused on three-letter rhyming words.

Two creative activities also return: make your own card, where kids can make birthday, father's day, mother's day, etc. cards using stamps and pre-printed text; and Create your own Story, where the user selects the characters and story path to create a very simple,four page printable storybook.

Ease of Install / Use
Bailey's is easy to use on a Mac - no installation required! On a PC, the program takes up almost 3 MB of disk space. None of our reviewers reported difficulty with installation or initial use.

Methodology
Most of the activities in Bailey's Book House can be used in two modes: as click and explore opportunities, or as question and answer practice sessions. For example, in the letter machine, the user can randomly explore the keyboard, or be asked by a snake to select specific keys. Both our parent and teacher reviewers felt that this was a real strength of the Bailey's program.

Although no reading ability is required, mouse skills are necessary for the child to personally interact with the computer.

Proxy Parent Value
Proxy parent value is SuperKids measure of how well and how long a program holds a child's attention. Our reviewers report that the original Bailey's was excellent on this measure, and they expect the enhanced version to be equally strong. "My husband will never forget when our 3 year-old daughter got up early on father's day and made him a custom card, all on her own initiative" said one of our parent reviewers. "He must have told everyone he knew about it!"

Best for...
Bailey's Book House is a good selection for a pre- or early reader, who is capable of using a mouse.

Bottom-Line
Bailey's Book House is one of the classic "must-haves" in early learning software.

See also the Summary Rating Table for comparisons with other Early Learning software titles, and the SuperKids Buyers Guide for current market prices of PC and Mac versions.

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SuperKids Review of Bailey's Book House. SuperKids Educational Software Review provides unbiased reviews of children's software by parents, teachers, and kids.