Word Parts

Word Parts from Sunburst, 1999

Reviewers: Shirley Baker - Teacher/Parent and
Melanie Baker - Daughter - 9 years old
Quincy, MA
E-mail: sbaker770@aol.com

Melanie and I reviewed Word Parts which is a word building program in Tenth Planet's Literacy Series. It is produced and published by Sunburst (1999) and is available on a CD-ROM for both PC's and Mac's. The package does not include any extra components such as stickers or maps, etc. but does provide specific lesson plans and black line masters for reproduction. Melanie and I reviewed Word Parts on a PC over the last several days of August. It is my understanding that this program is primarily targeted to school districts and is not available in stores. The recommended age range is first through third grade. The price for a single site license is $79.95 - $129.95 and discounts are available for a larger site license. For example, twenty-five installations would cost $399.95 or $15.99 each.
Rating: 9 on a scale of 1 to 10, Way Cool.

What the software does - The focus of this software is to allow children to build bigger words from smaller, more familiar words. It also allows students to develop decoding skills and teaches phonemic awareness.

How the software does this - Word Parts is broken into six activity chunks. Each activity chuck begins with a short Quick Time movie which features a brief overview of the activity. The publisher states that the activities should be done in sequence but we did not find that was necessary.

Activity one - Students group pictures into different sound categories. These pages can be added to the student's individual journals.
Activity two - Students make compound words which can be added to the student's individual wordbank.
Activity three - Students unscramble letters to make words that can then be added to a student's individual wordbank.
Activity four - Students use base words to make other words utilizing prefixes and suffixes that are provided. New words can then be added to student's individual wordbank.
Activity five - Students are given a riddle to solve using rhyming words. Two words answers are the norm and one word is provided and the students must come up with the second word that rhymes with the first word. For instance, what do you call a silly rabbit? A funny bunny. Bunny was the word that was provided and Melanie had to come up with funny. These riddles could then be added to student's individual journals.
Activity six - Students fill words into blanks to make a silly story. Only the type of word is displayed so the students does not know how the story will play out. The story can then be added to student's individual journals. This was the one activity that we felt really needed to be done in sequence because the student must have a variety of types of words in their word bank, i.e..... objects, places, colors, pets, foods, numbers, etc. in order to be able to complete their stories.

The teacher's/parent's point of view - I felt this would be appropriate software to use in the primary grades. The teacher can have a class list will all her/his students listed and can access each individual student's journal and wordbank, which allow the teacher to know where each student is excelling and where the student needs to spend more time. It also could be used for assessment purposes. The journal also provides an area for the teacher to make personalized comments that the student can then read or even listen to. Both the journal and wordbank can be printed out and by printing out individual wordbanks, a teacher could then individualize spelling and vocabulary words. I also found it easy to use. I am not a big one for manuals, I learn better by doing and this software was very easy to learn. I really didn't need to look at the manual although the manual is quite comprehensive for those who learn better with the manual. The software allows the children to practice keyboard skills, whereas some of the words needed to be typed. Moreover, the narrator speaks exactly what was typed so the student can hear what is wrong with the word and subsequently can edit the word until it is correct. In addition, letters and words are not only written on the screen but the students can also hear the words and the sounds of individual letters and syllables. I think the most positive aspect was my daughter was learning new words and sounds while she was actively engaged. The only thing that drove me slightly crazy was that the Quick Time movie played each time an activity was chosen regardless of how many times you accessed the activity. The movies get old quickly! Way Cool rating of 9. I thought what really made the software Way Cool was the interactive component. Students, well, o.k. my daughter, was learning by doing which totally fits her learning style.

A nine year old's point of view - I thought is was fun and easy to use. I learned stuff like putting words together and sounding out syllables. I liked printing out the journal and the journal could talk to me and my mom could say stuff about my journal right on the page. I really thought the rhyming riddles were cool and funny. You know you got the answer right when they laughed at your answer. The big thing I didn't like was The Word Tones, I thought they were weird. My Way Cool rating is a Way Cool 9.

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