Lifesigns DS

Lifesigns DS is a mix of ideas that perplexed as much as they enticed. Biology or medical students may find some educational entertainment here, but other than them I struggle to see who would play it.

KrissX XBLA

KrissX engages and educates with a simple word puzzle on XBLA. After the curriculum obbsessed clasroom learning, a little light haphazzard challenge is more that welcome in my book.

Music DS

Music DS offers genuine tuition, inspired from montessori and Japanese know-how. While players have to work quite hard, the pay off is real musical learning.

More Touchmaster DS

Everything about More Touchmaster is appealing and, well, just plain more-ish. Its like a half-finished bar of chocolate thats open, so you might as well have another square or two or three. Everything about it, from the cuddly icons for user profiles to the sound effects, is designed suck you in and turn you into a serious DS junkie.

Fable 2 360

I love playing games after a long day teaching at school, it's a great way to escape for a while. Fable 2 was one of our family's must have games from last year but for some reason I only managed to play it for a few hours before it was consigned to the pile of unfinished titles. My two sons on the other hand spent many hours on it and both finished it to varying degrees of 'completeness'.

Jewel Quest Solitaire DS

Once upon a time there was Minesweeper. And, for that matter, any number of other incredibly simple but terrifyingly addictive mini-games that came free with your PC. Whilst trawling through new releases on different consoles I often wonder why it is that the improvements in memory and technology sometimes make games duller, not better. If, like me, you hanker for something simple, playable and instantly addictive, Jewel Quest Solitaire is the game for you.

My Spanish Coach DS

As a parent and educator I've been dubious about these language games, yet my children seem keen to play them, so I found myself looking over their shoulders with this Spanish tutor. I was immediately impressed when the game directed them to play with the sound turned up, or if they couldn't have the volume up that they should use headphones. Hearing spoken language is one of the main ways that children pick up language skills, so to me this is vital in a teaching game like this.

Math Blaster DS

Math Blaster is a very welcome addition to the motivate-your-child-to-learn series of games that is currently making inroads into the DS market. If you can spare twenty minutes from your busy schedule to show your younger kids how to play, then it will certainly pay dividends as they begin to make serious forays into Math at school.

My French Coach DS

'Can my DS really teach me a foreign language?' you may wonder. Unsurprisingly perhaps, that really depends on just how motivated you are - not on how good the game is. If you've got the drive and are willing to overlook the flaws, you'll find that My French Coach is a well-packaged and sometimes compulsive game that can provide a framework for little-and-often learning that will definitely improve your pronunciation and passive skills, if nothing else.

Word Fu iPhone

There are a lot of word games in the App store these days. Many of these, like Bookworm or Wordjong focus on vocabulary and learning. Word Fu (from ngmoco who brought us Rolando and Topple) is much more of an action game - akin to Boggle - focusing on reaction times and conjugation than drawing multi-sylabulled constructions from the recesses of your mind.