Cheap Franklin the Turtle: Goes to School (Software) (Macintosh, Windows) Price

Areas for play on the first disk include the schoolhouse, theater, and playground. Each features three fun activities, found by moving the cursor around the area. (It changes from an arrow to a star when you've found a game.) Every game's difficulty level can be set individually, and once each game is mastered at each skill level, players get to attend an official graduation ceremony with Franklin and friends. Basic preschool- and kindergarten-level skills are reinforced, including counting, measuring, sorting, identifying colors, practicing phonics, recognizing words, and learning the alphabet.

The second disk in the set is mainly for parents. It includes a list of skills each game is designed to teach, as well as nearly 30 pages of printable activities, which kids will love to color when computer time is over. A short synopsis of each of the books in the Franklin series is also available, as are interviews with the creators of the series.

The activity CD-ROM installs painlessly, and many children won't have a problem navigating around the screens by themselves after the first couple of visits with an adult. No installation is necessary to access the second, more informational disk, so you can pop it in when you have the time. (Ages 4 to 6) --Jill Lightner