Review by Dana Villamagna, Common Sense Education | Updated April 2013

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More Trucks -- by Duck Duck Moose

Name: More Trucks -- by Duck Duck Moose
Item: More Trucks -- by Duck Duck Moose
Rating: 3
Author: Dana Villamagna

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Fun on-ramp to learning about motion, transportation, and more

Subjects & skills

Grades This grade range is based on learning appropriateness and doesn't take into account privacy. It's determined by Common Sense Education, not the product's publisher.

Pre-K–K

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Bright, colorful design and cute characters immediately engages kids.

Kids choose from four scenes for gameplay.

Collect cars on a flatbed to drive to the junkyard and crush.

Monster Trucks drive over hills and collect coins.

Pros: The real-life motions and sounds made by the vehicles will likely delight preschoolers.

Cons: More verbal instructions on two of the games could avoid any confusion for preschoolers.

Bottom Line: High-quality visuals and sounds on four easy games makes for fun preschool play with transportation in motion.

How Can I Teach with This Tool?

In the classroom, this app can help pre-reading kids learn a bit about sequencing, order, and thinking and reasoning, especially if teachers ask questions related to what the vehicles look like and how they are moving. For example, as kids load the vehicles onto the flatbed truck, teachers can point out the different shapes and colors of the cars and trucks they are loading. Also, there's a sequence of events that must happen before kids can crush cars at the dump with the giant dinosaur foot. Ask kids about this sequence to see if they recall what has to happen first, second, third, and so on.

What Is It?

This is the second app about trucks by the developer, Duck Duck Moose. It has four main games built into four scenes -- Monster Truck, Fire Truck, Flatbed Tow Truck and Junkyard, and Crane and Construction Site. Kids choose one of four scenes and then listen to the instructions. For the Monster Truck scene, kids tap a truck and then drive it by pressing and holding a back or forward arrow button to move it or an up arrow to jump it to collect coins. In the Fire Truck scene, kids play tic-tac-toe and then fight a fire -- deciding where to spray the water. For the Tow Truck, kids swipe vehicles onto a flatbed to move them to the junkyard where they can help crush them. At the Construction Site, kids pickup shapes and build a tower to knock down.

One of the most dynamic aspects of this app is that the trucks and cars move, bump and roll in ways that are surprisingly similar to real life vehicles and the machine-related noises are also very realistic. Also, the background music includes diverse tunes, from jazz to Latin and surf and the narrator is a 12-year-old boy so the instructions sound friendly and relatable for kids.

Is It Good for Learning?

More Trucks -- by Duck Duck Moose is a lightly educational, play-with-motion app for preschoolers and, perhaps, kids in kindergarten. This app will likely especially appeal to those kids who are interested in monster trucks, fire-fighting trucks, and crushing cars.

Kids can learn a little bit about motion, stacking, sequencing, problem solving, and shapes, all while following directions. There's also a tic-tac-toe game that kids can play against the firehouse dog, which teaches beginning strategy. More Trucks -- by Duck Duck Moose is like an on-ramp of fun that kids can take toward learning. Basic lessons in movement, shapes, and problem solving are built into the games, but the app's focus is having fun with vehicles.

Rating Details

Overall Rating

Engagement Is the product stimulating, entertaining, and engrossing? Will kids want to return?

Bright, interactive games are full of colorful cars, trucks, cranes, and more. Each of the four scenes looks and plays very differently, so kids can explore and find the games they like best.

Pedagogy Is learning content seamlessly baked-in, and do kids build conceptual understanding? Is the product adaptable and empowering? Will skills transfer?

Kids learn through play and observation. Kids also will learn if parents, caregivers, and teachers use the bright visuals to engage kids with questions about what they're seeing and doing during fun gameplay.

Support Does the product take into account learners of varying abilities, skill levels, and learning styles? Does it address both struggling and advanced students?

Verbal instructions and visuals (such as arrows for moving in different directions) help kids navigate each game. The Monster Truck game provides a numerical total to let kids know how many coins they've earned.

Common Sense Reviewer

Dana Villamagna Classroom teacher

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Featured review by
Erin W. , Classroom teacher

Classroom teacher

Simple game to amuse preschoolers, although it is not very educational.

While this app was in the "educational" section, I did not find many educational components. It does work on hand eye coordination, and reaction time (as most video games do), it also minimally involves counting as children can earn gold coins and there is a running tally of said coins. So while I wouldn't use this app as a teaching tool, it certainly could be used as a reward or break time activity.

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