Great Games and Accessories for the PC.Learning Ladder Years 1 and 2 is an extremely good CD-ROM aimed at children aged 5-7. It presents a huge number of activities that would help to support the school curriculum.

Children can navigate their way around the playroom, which will develop their confidence with the mouse. Children will enjoy making things move on the screen. There is also a range of fun activities, such as painting and copying the tune.

The program also helps to consolidate and reinforce what children are learning in literacy, numeracy and science at school. There are games involving identifying sounds, making words, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division and much more. Children are rewarded with stickers as they complete activities correctly, which they will love collecting and putting in their own sticker book. --Amanda York

Dorling Kindersley has produced yet another outstanding and completely new interactive learning system-- My First CD-ROM: Getting Ready For School--to help children develop key pre-school skills while providing parents with advice and information on child development. It has been written in consultation with Sue Robson, a renowned early years' teacher, educational consultant and author, who is a senior lecturer at the Roehampton Institute.

Meet Zack, a Jack-in-the-box and friendly on-screen guide whose aim is to make learning fun. Hear his clear explanations and animated instructions on how to play the six easy games. Each one can be adapted to suit your child's level of understanding and their fine motor skills. For example, choices can be made between using the mouse or the keyboard, or selecting different speeds or levels of difficulty, choosing between hearing letters as phonetic sounds or as names, and so on. This flexibility enables games to be adapted over and over again as your child's skills develop, so building and developing a child's confidence.

The package is designed for 3-5 year-olds, under parental supervision, or for slightly older children to use on their own. Progress can be monitored and difficulty levels can be adjusted according to age and ability. The games aim to acquaint and help children with the key topics covered in the first year at school, and include number recognition, logic, counting, mathematical language, shapes and sizes, spatial awareness, speaking and listening, letter recognition and letter sounds. Work sheets can be printed out which can extend learning beyond the PC. Buy this package for your youngster, and lay firm foundations with its highly effective approach to parent-assisted learning. --Susan Naylor

Learning Ladder Year 6 is another excellent CD-ROM from Dorling Kindersley. It's aimed at children aged 10-11 and structured so that children listen to a lesson and then carry out exercises that help to consolidate the literacy and numeracy they are learning as part of the school curriculum. This CD-ROM would be invaluable for any child in Year 6 who is preparing for their SATs.

Exercises can be done at five different levels of difficulty, so that children are challenged and continue to make progress. For every 400 points that a child scores, they are rewarded with new pictures to use with the printing machine. As they gather more pictures they can enjoy designing their own cards, invitations and labels, which can be printed out.

Children can also have lots of fun navigating around Science City and learning lots of facts along the way. For example, they can find out about animals, food chains and gravity. The progress tracker clearly shows how each child is getting on with a system of green and red lights. This would quickly show parents where more help is needed. --Amanda York

Great Games and Accessories for the PC.Learning Ladder Year 4 is a fantastic CD-ROM aimed at Year 4 children. It is structured so that children listen to a lesson and then carry out exercises that help to consolidate the literacy and numeracy they are learning as part of the school curriculum.

Exercises can be done at five different levels of difficulty, so that children are challenged and continue to make progress. For every 400 points that a child scores, they are rewarded with new pictures to use with the printing machine. As they gather more pictures they can enjoy making their own cards, invitations and labels, which can be printed out.

Children can also have lots of fun navigating around Science City and learning lots of facts along the way. For example, they can have a go at the science quiz and find out about roots, leaves and flowers. The progress tracker clearly shows how each child is getting on with a system of green and red lights. This would quickly show parents where more help is needed. --Amanda York

Become a Science Explorer is another excellent CD-ROM from Dorling Kindersley aimed at children aged 6-10 years old. Children will love the challenge of going on a mission and trying to become a Science Explorer.

Fizz, the helpful ball of energy, guides children around the different environments where children can carry out activities, answer questions or look at information screens. The graphics are excellent and there is a wealth of scientific information for children to find out in a variety of interesting ways. Children's learning is also cleverly extended when they're given further explanations once they have answered a question.

Children are rewarded with prizes, badges, stickers, rosettes, medals and the ultimate prize of becoming a Science Explorer. They can use their Science Workbook to make scientific observations, answer questions and collect stickers--guaranteed to turn any child into a budding scientist.

There is a range of science experiments that can be printed out and undertaken. These would be ideal for parents to go through with younger children using the comprehensive parents' guide. There are also some very good worksheets, which would help to consolidate children's learning.

Become a Science Explorer is a fantastic CD-ROM that really supports the science curriculum in schools. This would be an excellent buy for parents or teachers of children aged 6-10 years old. --Amanda York

Dorling Kindersley has produced an excellent series of interactive parent-assisted learning packages designed for young children, of which My First Number is one. The CD-ROM is aimed at children aged 3-5 years and is especially useful for pre-school children or those needing more practice in early learning number skills.

The package has been specifically designed to give youngsters an introduction to counting and sorting, and to help them gain confidence in using a computer. The games have been developed to allow children to play them on their own, but help may be needed initially, until youngsters get used the format. Make the sessions happy and relaxed, helping your child to learn with lots of fun. When playing alone, the fun will continue as they make decisions for themselves, and so their learning carries on without them even knowing. Game speeds and levels of difficulty can be altered, progress can be tracked and measured and help is automatically adjusted according to a child's responses.

There are five easy games to play and they have been designed to be played in order. Meet Little Penguin and White Bear, appealing and humorous characters who use lots of songs, rhymes and animations to give practice in counting, number recognition, colour, and recognition of 2-D shapes, ordering numbers to create correct counting sequences, and practice in developing problem-solving skills.

The CD-ROM is easy to install (instructions are on the disc, and there are comprehensive support notes for parents with full explanations about the games and activities that are accessed from the parent icon on the tool bar). This is a valuable introduction to key mathematical concepts capitalising on the natural eagerness young children have to learn. --Susan Naylor

Become a History Explorer is an excellent CD-ROM in this series, which will turn any child into a budding historian. It's aimed at children aged 6-10 years old and encourages them to find out about eight exciting periods in history, through games, quizzes and information screens.

Children will love the challenge of collecting the pieces of the time trail, so that they can rescue the history professor who has been trapped in time by the time fugitive. Children must travel in the time machine and explore each historical world in order to find all the pieces and become a history explorer. There is an excellent journal in which children can record their travels. This would help to consolidate what they have learnt about each period in history. Having answered questions along the way children are rewarded with stickers, which are kept in their journal. There are also activities to do, for example, design a coat of arms, which can be saved in the journals, along with photos and other souvenirs. There is also an excellent index menu that allows children to view information screens on a very wide range of topics. This would be particularly good to use if children were having trouble answering any of the quiz questions.

Become a History Explorer would be an excellent buy for children aged 7-11 years old who would love to complete the mission and rescue the history professor, while exploring an extremely good range of historical information. --Amanda York

Bear and Penguin's Big Reading Adventure is another excellent program developed by Dorling Kindersley. It is aimed at children aged 5-7 years old and helps to develop a wide range of literacy skills through four fun games.

There are very clear instructions and each game is initially demonstrated, so children will quickly be able to develop confidence and independence. The games, which can be played at three different levels, have been carefully developed to practice the skills that children are learning as part of the literacy hour in school; for example, spelling words by choosing the missing sounds and putting words in the correct order to create a sentence. There are also two storybooks that children can choose to read together or alone. If children want a break from the games there is also an excellent printing section where children can make their own stationary and create lists, cards, writing paper and signs. This is a brilliant way to encourage children to write for a range of different purposes.

As children play the games they collect snowflakes and they are then rewarded with a sticker for their sticker album. When all the stickers have been collected they can print out a certificate and listen to the reward song.

There is an excellent guide for parents that discusses the skills the games are developing. The child profile shows parents how many times children have played each game and at what level and also suggests follow-on worksheets that can be printed out and used with children.

Bear and Penguin's Big Reading Adventure would be an excellent buy for parents or teachers to use with children aged 5-7 years. --Amanda York

Become a British Isles Explorer is a fun CD-ROM aimed at children aged 6-10 years old. It encourages them to play games, look at maps and find out a whole range of interesting facts about the British Isles through very informative information screens.

Children will love the challenge of following Jo on his five journeys around the British Isles and collecting five medals to become a British Isles Explorer. Children can explore the map of the British Isles. They can look at regions, and towns to find out about famous places, people and much more. The trips can be recorded in the child's own travel log, together with stickers and photos that are collected along the way. A great way to reinforce the information they have found out. There are a range of fun activities for children to do, for example, recording the weather, sending postcards and printing out map outlines which can be filled in. There is also an excellent Index Menu that children can use to find out about a wide range of topics and look at word definitions. They could use this menu to answer any questions that they might be having trouble with.

Become a British Isles Explorer would be a good buy for children aged 7-11 years old and it would really extend their understanding of the British Isles. This would be excellent to use if a child was doing a topic or project on the British Isles. --Amanda York