Preschool Pack Copyright (c) 1992 PractiComp Vicki Watson 6490 Dubois Rd. Delaware, OH 43015-8931 614-548-5043 Compuserve 71043,3706 The colorful graphics, songs, and speech of Preschool Pack will be sure to capture the attention of your preschooler. From the main menu screen, which contains a cat which meows and winks when clicked, to the bee which frowns when a mistake is made in the matching game, you and your preschooler will appreciate the careful design and attention to detail of Preschool Pack. The program does not require any keyboard input - all activities may be performed entirely with a mouse. Through five different and entertaining activities your preschooler will learn about counting, number recognition, the alphabet, colors, matching, and classifying. Activities include: "Animal Homes", where animals must be placed in their appropriate homes - either farm, forest, or circus; "Balloons", where the user must click on a color block matching the color of a rising balloon before it pops; "Matching", a memory game with an animated bee rewarding the user who locates all matches; "Counting", where the user counts along with the computer as a variety of colorful images, from dinosaurs to dolls, are displayed; and "ABC's" where the user must find all letters which match a displayed letter. "ABC's" uses speech to pronounce each letter as it is selected. All activities are reinforced with cheerful music and animation sequences. Preschool Pack was developed with the help of my two daughters - Lisa (age 6) and Kristy (age 3). I hope your children enjoy our program as much as we have. Your registration fee makes it possible for us to continue producing programs such as Preschool Pack. If you continue to use this program, I hope you will decide to become a registered user by sending in the following registration form. See the following form for details about obtaining a copy of PPK which will greet your child by name! Shareware Registration Form - PPK 1.0 Benefits Of Registering: All registered users receive over 50 extra pictures for use in Preschool Pack. You will also receive the most current version at the time of registration, support via phone or mail, and notification of and substantial discounts on program upgrades. The initial shareware screen is removed from the registered version, ie. the registered version will go directly to the main menu screen. [ ] $10.00 (Standard Registration Fee, includes the benefits listed above.) (or) [ ] $15.00 (Your child will be greeted by name using the program's speech synthesizer.) Child's Name: ________________________________ [ ] $3.00 "Sounds Like A..." trial disk (see description at the end of this file) [ ] $2.50 shipping (for orders outside the U.S. or Canada) The $15.00 registration provides a customized version with a welcome screen using computerized speech to greet your child by name. Be sure to print the child's name clearly in the space provided above. Please send your check or money order to: PractiComp 6490 Dubois Rd. Delaware, OH 43015-8931 Name: _________________________________________ Address: _________________________________________ _________________________________________ _________________________________________ Phone: ________________________ Disk Size: [ ] 5 1/4" [ ] 3 1/2" I received the shareware disk from: ________________________ Comments or suggestions: _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ DISTRIBUTION BBS Name: PPK10A.ZIP PPK10B.ZIP (disks 1 & 2) Preschool Pack is a shareware product and may be freely copied and shared with other computer users. Continued use beyond a reasonable evaluation period requires registration. PPK may be copied and distributed by shareware distributors or posted to Bulletin Board systems. Distributors, please include all files listed below when distributing this product. DISTRIBUTION FILES PPK may be distributed on a single 720K disk, or two 360K disks. *** Disk1 HELPME.BAT * help batch file READ.ME * installation instructions BROWSE.EXE * file viewer PPK1.EXE * a self-extracting archive containing: PPK.EXE * executable file PPK.DOC * program documentation PPK.GXL * library of graphic images *** Disk2 PPK2.EXE * a self-extracting archive containing: PPK.VOI * speech library file PPK.DVX * speech index file PROGRAM REQUIREMENTS Preschool Pack requires 640K RAM, a hard drive, an EGA or VGA color monitor, and a mouse. PPK produces speech via digitized voice files. Because the speech is produced through the PC's internal speaker, no additional sound cards are necessary. INSTALLATION Make a directory on your hard drive for Preschool Pack, then change to that directory. The PPK files are compressed into the two files PPK1.EXE and PPK2.EXE. These files will be found on 2 disks in the 5 1/4" version, or may be on a single disk if using 3 1/2" disks. The required files are then extracted by typing PPK1 and PPK2. This may sound complicated, but really isn't. At the DOS prompt, type the following commands, pressing ENTER after each command. The information in ()'s should not be typed. MD \PPK CD \PPK (Insert disk1) A:PPK1 (Insert disk2, if using 2 disks) A:PPK2 You must run PPK2 whether you are installing from 1 or 2 disks. If you have 2 PPK disks, insert the second disk before running PPK2, otherwise just leave the single disk in the drive. PPK may be installed from any drive. If installing from a drive other than A, substitute that drive letter where you see A: above. RUNNING PRESCHOOL PACK Change to the Preschool Pack directory and type PPK. For slower computers (around 12 Mhz), you may find the animation is too slow. If this is the case, start the program with a /s parameter. You would type: PPK /S This parameter will speed up the mouse running across the main menu screen, the Bee in the matching game, and the Butterfly in the ABC game. PRESCHOOL PACK INSTRUCTIONS Click on STOP, or press ESC, to exit a screen or the program. MAIN MENU SCREEN Click on the musical notes to turn music on/off. Click on the lips to turn speech on/off. For the music/speech an X over the icon indicates that the item is turned off. If you want to turn it back on, just click again and the X will disappear. The music and speech are both produced using the PC's internal speaker, therefore it is not possible to adjust the volume. The volume level of the music and speech will depend upon the quality of your PC's internal speaker. Click on the cat's head and it will meow and wink. Click on the bottom right corner of the screen and a mouse will run across the screen. Click on the STOP sign to exit PPK and return to DOS. COUNTING: Click on 123 for the counting game. When the next screen appears, a large number will be displayed in the upper left corner, and that number will be spoken. For example the number 7 may appear. You should then click the mouse anywhere on the screen 7 times. For each click a picture will appear on the screen. The program will count as each item appears. When you have clicked the correct number of times, the bear will dance and a song will play. You may continue with the next number or click on STOP to end the counting game. The child should be encouraged to count along with the program as the objects appear. A mouse click will not be recognized by the program while the program is speaking. Please wait until the number is spoken before clicking again. When the child begins to count correctly you may wish to turn the speech off for this activity. The mouse may be clicked more rapidly with speech turned off. COLORS: Click on the balloons for the color game. You will see two rows of color blocks. A colored balloon will appear on the right side of the screen and begin rising to the top of the screen. Click on the block which is the same color as the balloon. If you click on the correct block, that balloon will appear at the bottom of the screen and a different colored balloon will appear. If you do not click the right color before the balloon reaches the top of the screen, that balloon will pop and a new balloon will appear. Play continues until the display of correct balloons at the bottom of the screen is full. You may click on the rabbit to speed up the balloon or on the turtle to slow down the balloon. A song will play when all the balloons are collected. A new game will be set up allowing you to play again, or click the STOP sign to return to the main menu. MATCHING: Click on the squares to play the matching game. Click on a square to reveal a picture, then click on another to find it's match. A buzz will indicate no match, a beep will indicate a match. The bee will frown when a mistake is made and will smile when a correct match is found. Clicking on the bee will make him fly over the screen. The bee will fly and a song will play when all matches are found. A new matching game will be set up allowing you to play again, or click the STOP sign to return to the main menu. ANIMAL HOMES: Click on the tiger to play the animal homes game. The next screen will display a barn, a circus tent, and a forest. In the lower, right-hand corner an animal will be displayed. Click on the picture that represents the correct home for this animal. If the home you click on is not correct you will hear a buzz and will be able to try again. When the correct home is clicked on, a full screen picture of that home will appear. You may now click anywhere to place the animal on this screen. You may click repeatedly to move the animal to different positions on this screen. When the animal is placed where you want it, click STOP to return to the ANIMAL HOMES screen. A new animal will appear and you can repeat the above process. When all animals for a home have been placed, a song will play. When all animals for the farm, circus, and forest have been placed you will be returned to the main menu. You may also return to the main menu before all animals are placed by clicking on the STOP sign, or pressing ESC at the screen containing the pictures of the three animal homes. The animals included are listed below: FARM CIRCUS FOREST --------------------------------------------------------- Cow Seal Deer Pig Tiger Skunk Goat Lion Snake Chicken Monkey Fox Ducks Elephant Owl Sheep Raccoon Pony Goose ALPHABET: Click on ABC for the alphabet game. You will see a large letter in the upper left corner, and the name of this letter will be spoken. A grid containing various letters will be displayed on the right. Click on each letter in the grid which matches the large letter on the left. As each letter in the grid is clicked on, the name of that letter will be spoken. If a matching letter is clicked it will be high- lighted. When all matching letters are found a song will play and the butterfly will fly across the screen. Below the large letter at the left, you will see a box with [A a Aa]. Click on this box at any time to change the case of the game. Click on the capital 'A' to change to all upper-case. Click on the lower-case 'a' to change to all lower-case. Click on the upper/lower case 'Aa' to change to a mixture of upper and lower case. You may click on the butterfly to play the ABC song, or click on the large letter in the upper left corner to hear the entire alphabet spoken. The game will continue until you click on the STOP sign or press ESC to return to the main menu. ========================================================================= S O U N D S L I K E A . . . "Sounds Like A..." is another shareware program for children available from PractiComp. A description of this program follows. You may receive a trial disk containing "Sounds Like A..." by including an additional $3.00 with your registration of PPK. ========================================================================= "Sounds Like A..." is a unique and entertaining game for children ranging in age from approximately 1 1/2 to 7 years of age. The program uses colorful graphics and a variety of high-quality sounds ranging from a clock "ticking" to a dog "barking". In the first of two games, the child must find the picture which matches a sound. Your child may hear, for example, a cow "mooing". He/she will then click on a square containing the picture of a cow. A game consists of 12 sound/picture pairs. As each picture is matched with the accompanying sound, parts of a larger underlying picture are revealed. The second game is a matching or memory game with a slight twist. The child must match a picture with the appropriate sound. For example, if the child clicks on a block revealing a picture of a donkey, he must find the block which contains the "Hee Haw" sound in order to make a match.