Showing posts with label alphabet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label alphabet. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

The Alphabet Killer Review

The Alphabet Killer
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I'll admit, I have a morbid fascination with serial killer movies. They harness a raw energy that is almost overwhelming. There is often a strange connection with the victims, the detectives, and sometimes even the killers themselves(or is it just me?). Plus there is a stark fear generated by recognizing a pattern and watching people struggle to prevent further mayhem.
THE ALPHABET KILLER is a pretty well-crafted, fictional tale. It's derived from some unsolved murders that took place in Rochester, NY, during the early 70's. A few young girls with matching initials would turn up dead in nearby towns that were spelled with the same first letter (i.e. Carla Castille in Churchville, Wendy Walsh in Webster).
A female detective(Eliza Dushku) is on the case, and she quickly becomes obsessed with cracking it. Actually, she's the one that starts to crack. She gets completely consumed, the mystery eats at her mind as she starts talking to herself and hallucinating (same thing happens to me when I watch reality TV shows).
Anyway, the movie takes a pretty dramatic shift early on when this woman loses control and attempts suicide. She is diagnosed with scizophrenia and admitted to a mental hospital.
Several times throughout this movie, we're shown the visions that this crazy woman sees--ghastly dead children that constantly haunt her. This is done for shocking effect, but I thought it was completely overdone. Kinda seemed like a ripoff of a Japanese ghost story film.
The story then proceeds as the police are completely baffled by the subsequent Alphabet murders. The mentally unfit cop is put back on the case, possibly due to her past romantic relationship with the chief. And of course, crazy is not something you can just sell on amazon.com.
Director Rob Schmidt does a decent job at mounting suspense. This film attempts to be dark, but doesn't completely succeed. It is interesting as a psychological descent into madness. I thought the cast did a very solid job. This has no gore or reenactment of the murders themselves, so some might get bored. Worth a rental.

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A ten year old girl is found brutally murdered outside the small blue-collar city of Rochester, New York, and obsessed police detective Megan Paige (Eliza Dushku of BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER and DOLLHOUSE) suffers a mental breakdown while trying to solve the crime. But when the child-killings resume two years later, Megan’s return to the investigation also brings back her own horrific hallucinations. Even if she can prove a ‘double initial’ connection to the slayings, will she hang onto her sanity long enough to catch a psychopath? Cary Elwes (SAW), Michael Ironside (STARSHIP TROOPERS), Bill Moseley (THE DEVIL’S REJECTS), Carl Lumbly (ALIAS) and Academy Award® winner Timothy Hutton co-star in this chilling thriller directed by Rob Schmidt.

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Sunday, December 16, 2012

Leapfrog Learning DVDs 5-Pack (Talking Words Factory / Talking Words Factory II / Learn to Read at the Storybook Factory / Letter Factory /Math Circus) Review

Leapfrog Learning DVDs 5-Pack (Talking Words Factory / Talking Words Factory II / Learn to Read at the Storybook Factory / Letter Factory /Math Circus)
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I have to admit, I am the type of homeschool mother who reads reviews before purchasing what I use in training my children. Most of the reviews I read on the Leap Frog Learning DVD'S were positive and BOY were they ever right!! I have a 5 year old (almost 6) daughter who STRUGGLED learning alpha letters and sounds. She had her favorite letters, but I had to sit with her and go over and over and over the others....this was completely frustrating to her and I. That is until we received Leap Frog Learning DVD's 5 pack. These dvd's are educationally and musically stimulating. My daughter learned all of the alphabet sounds in less than a week, FOR REAL! She has taken to singing the songs and sounding out the letters so much that she is driving her brother crazy. She sounds her letters to sleep. She writes the alphabet on everything, upper and lower case. She tells us what a period, exclamation point and a comma is. And of course sings like mad! She has starting reading and LOVES it. This is by far the best money ever spent on teaching materials ~

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5 pack of LeapFrog dvds: 1) LeapFrog: Talking Words Factory II: The Code Word Caper 2) LeapFrog: Learn to Read at the Storybook Factory 3) LeapFrog: Letter Factory 4) LeapFrog: Math Circus 5) LeapFrog: Talking Words Factory

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Monday, August 15, 2011

Blue's Clues - Blue's Room - Alphabet Power (1996) Review

Blue's Clues - Blue's Room - Alphabet Power (1996)
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In this DVD, Blue and her friends explore the alphabet, all the way from A-to-Z. The episodes on this DVD all fit that idea very well and together, it's a great package."Blue's Room: Alphabet Power" contains an episode of "Blue's Room" and three episodes of "Blue's Clues:""The Power of the Alphabet"
This is the new episode for this DVD --- a new "Blue's Room" story in which we join Blue and her playroom friends for an alphabet playdate. Of course, it's not an alphabet playdate without the alphabet and they're all there, from A-to-Z, all with little googly eyes on the top. Blue makes words with the letters and then pretends to be the words that they've made. We play Polka Dots' puzzles and receive letters to make a word. Later, a real kid joins Blue for a reading of the story "Chicka Chicka ABC" and the letters of the alphabet act out the story.
"The Alphabet Train"
Joe, Blue and all of our friends in the Blue's Clues house work together to create a train in which each of the cabs contain an item that starts with a different letter of the alphabet. "B" is blue, naturally and "J" is Joe, but we've still got a lot of letters left to go. We help out with this, even skidooing into a magnet board to find some things. As for Blue's Clues, we play the game to help Joe figure out what Blue wants to put in the very last cab of the alphabet train.
"Let's Write"
Nice one --- Joe and Blue have decided to make labels for all the different things in the house. We go around everywhere, helping them to make labels for things and also help to identify what things are based on already-existing labels. And for "Blue's Clues," we help Joe to figure out a label that Blue wants to write.
"Magenta's Messages"
Magenta goes for a day-trip to the beach and asks Joe and Blue to take care of her house. To do this, she's left us a series of messages --- both a set of instructions and individual messages to complete the different tasks. These generally include pictures and words. While all of this isn't strictly alphabet-related, it still completes the set nicely.These last two are bonus episodes for the DVD, although unlike past releases, they're no longer buried in the Special Features section. Instead, they're in the episode selection, under More Episodes, or you can also choose to play all episodes. Notice that there are no Steve episodes this time around --- if you or your kids don't like Joe, this DVD probably isn't the way to go.This release also has a few special features:
Doodle, Doodle, Spell
A fairly simple game in which the player is given two letters of a word and a picture and fills in the missing letter. Also includes one with four letters. If the wrong letter is put in, you get a simple Try Again screen, but if you get the right letter, then the image animates and makes some noise. Not too bad of a game, but could have been jazzed up a bit.
Nicktrition Tips for Parents
A two-page thing to read giving tips on getting kids to try healthy foods and such. I imagine this info can also be found somewhere on the Nick Jr. website.
Blue's Room Spots
Three spots featuring either song numbers or Blue with real kids. About two minutes long in total, but still a nice addition.
Previews for these other shows:
Dora the Explorer --- double-length DVD releases
Blue's Room --- other Blue's Room DVDs
Rugrats --- Tales From the Crib Christmas special
My Little Pony --- another Christmas special

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The Power of the Alphabet - Today we're having an alphabet playdate! And guess who's at the door...it's the one and only Alphabet! The infamous 26 letters have actually come over to our room and are ready to play. Adorable puppet letters with funny "take charge" personalities literally take over Blue's Room. Letter and words are everywhere! Throughout the episode, the letters show us all about "Alphabet Power"...the power to Read, Write, and Spell. We play an alphabet game of Doodle in which we learn how to write letters. There's an original Blue's Room game of "Spell it/Pretend it". When we read a word, Blue magically transforms into it. Then we pretend it along with Blue and the Home Viewer. Then our favorite neighbor, Antonio, comes over to share and read one of his favorite books with us, "Chika Chick ABC" by Bill Marin Jr. and John Archambault. By the end of our playdate, we realize just how powerful the alphabet really is!
The Alphabet Train - All aboard! Everyone's in the backyard building an Alphabet Train. The train is made up of twenty-six boxes- one for each letter of the alphabet- and we need to help find something for each box. We play Blue's Clues to figure out what Blue wants to put in the last box. We help Pail figure out which items begin with certain letters. Then we help Periwinkle put a group of letters in the right order. The train is almost finished when we skidoo into a world of letter magnets to identify words beginning with the letters V,W,X, and Y. when the train is complete, we sing a rousing song that names something starting with every letter of the alphabet. Bonus episodes/ Added Value-2nd Menu Page - approx. 50:00 minutes - on DVD only
Let's Write! - Joe and Blue are being writers today! We're making labels for things in our house- like hat, door and Sidetable Drawer. Using our finger, we help Joe write letters and words, paying special attention to the shapes and lines of each letter. And we play Blue's Clues to figure out what Blue wants to write. We help Marky the Marker write labels for boxes in our closet and then skidoo to help Palette write a whole word. We sing a song about some of our favorite letters with Palette, and then head back to solve Blue's Clues. At then end, we celebrate all the words we've written.
Magenta's Messages - Magenta is going on a trip to the beach- and she asked us to take care of her house while she's away! Magenta leaves us a message so we'll know what to do. Blue wants to write a message too, and we play Blue's Clues to figure out what it should say. We spend the whole day at Magenta's house, reading messages and figuring out how to water her plants and feed her fish. Her message tells us to go to the computer, where we hear "Bloop Bloop!" Magenta sent us an email! We help Joe read Megenta's message about what she's been doing at the beach. When Magenta gets home, she thanks us for having done such a wonderful job taking care of her house.

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Monday, July 4, 2011

Preschool Prep & Sight Words 7 DVD Pack (Meet the Letters, Meet the Numbers, Meet the Shapes, Meet the Colors, Meet the Sight Words 1, Meet the Sight Words 2, Meet the Sight Words 3) Review

Preschool Prep and Sight Words 7 DVD Pack (Meet the Letters, Meet the Numbers, Meet the Shapes, Meet the Colors, Meet the Sight Words 1, Meet the Sight Words 2, Meet the Sight Words 3)
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I purchased the entire 7 Preschool Prep videos. I was very pleased with the "Meet the sight word" series. I purchased them as an experiment but after watching them 10-12 times (at about 20 min. a time since we didn't watch the repeats) my 5 year old learned almost all of the sight words and my 4 year old learned about 1/2 of the the sight words. It is WELL worth your money, as I have spent an entire school year trying to teach these words. Once the kids know them, it makes reading so much easier because they don't have to sound out every word. I prefer "Meet the sight words" over Your Baby Can Read just because the kids will see the sight words in print in almost any book they pick up.
As for "Meet the Letters" it is a huge disappointment. My kids were so bored with it that they wouldn't even sit through 1/3 of it. Also, IT DOES NOT INCLUDE LETTER SOUNDS, which is fundamental for reading success. I purchased "LeapFrog Letter Factory DVD." which is much better for teaching letters and sounds. It is 35 min. long and is much more engaging. I will be using the letter factory DVD and the meet the sight words DVD. I suggest buying the Meet the Sight words and not the "Meet the Letters, Numbers, Colors, or Shapes.

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Learning has never been this easy!A study of over 50 babies and toddlers, who watched Meet the Letters, resulted in over 90% of these children having complete upper and lowercase letter recognition. Many learned in less than two weeks! Numbers, shapes, colors and sight words can be learneed in a few viewings. Box set includes Meet the Letters, Meet the Numbers, Meet the Shapes, Meet the Colors, Meet the Sight Words 1, Meet the Sight Words 2, Meet the Sight Words 3.

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