ThePolyglotsattheZoo

The playspace has fun incidental animations and accompanying audio. The written word for ‘zoo’ appears at the entrance and the written word for ‘juice’ appears over the juice bar.

The Polyglots at the Zoo playspace is a park-like space with animals in open enclosures. Special elements include interaction between the man with balloons and the Polyglots character (if enough balloons are exchanged, the character will float away). The elephant reacts when the Polyglots character says he is thirsty. Tapping on the rubbish bin reveals the monkey. The magpie, the flamingos and the giraffes each react in interesting ways when they are tapped.

This activity focuses on the words for various types of fruit along with the vocabulary for habitat items such as rocks, trees and grass. Children will also review expressing feelings and preferences such as ‘I’m hungry!’, ‘yum’ or ‘delicious’, and ‘yuck’ or ’disgusting’.

In this activity children interact with two animal characters, a panda and an orangutan, by feeding them a range of food items and adding items to their habitat. The emphasis is on species-appropriate food; the panda responds most positively to the bamboo and the orangutan to the rambutans. To feed the animals successfully, the food item must be held to the mouth of the animal while it eats. In this activity, children can also add foliage and other habitat items to the animal’s environment. The animal will react positively, and this reinforces the link between the animal’s welfare and its habitat.

This activity focuses on the words for various types of fruit in colour combinations.

This activity invites children to sort specific fruit from the conveyor belt into crates with corresponding pictures. Once tapped, the fruit items on the conveyor belt are named in the chosen language. If the food is moved to a crate and is a correct match, sound effects will acknowledge this and the fruit will be named in the chosen language. If the fruit is not a match, it counts as a miss and the fruit bounces out of the crate and off the screen. Children can control the degree of difficulty by selecting the speed of the conveyor belt. This activity has levels, with variables: language extension using colour revision words, the number of crates on screen, the inclusion of a cheeky monkey that may steal the fruit off the conveyor belt, and decoy fruit (a type of fruit that does not belong in any of the crates).

This activity focuses on the words for various types of fruit and drinks. It finishes with the written text for each word. This provides children with the opportunity to see the chosen language and perhaps begin to make comparisons with other writing systems that they may know.

This jigsaw puzzle will be a familiar activity to many children. Each jigsaw scene features pictures of fruit and drinks. On completion of the jigsaw, children will hear and see the words for each item on screen. They can select jigsaws of increasing levels of complexity and can vary this at any time.

This activity focuses on the words for expressing preferences for various types of fruit and drinks.

In this activity, a Polyglots character models the chosen language and the child is encouraged to reproduce it. The activity uses a picnic setting to provide a natural context for the sentences ‘I’m hungry’ and ‘I’m thirsty’. Fruit is concealed in the picnic basket and is provided by a monkey when the Polyglots character says he is hungry. It also appears when the child speaks into the microphone. After three items of fruit appear on each plate, the child can ‘eat’ his or her fruit by tapping on it until the whole piece has gone. A similar process then occurs with the drinks. The fruit is placed on a plate with a traditionally inspired design.

This activity introduces the phrase for asking for something and includes the words for various types of fruit. It also revises the colour words introduced in App 2.

In this role-play activity, the child blends different fruits into juice, to fulfil requests from two animal characters (the camel and water vole). The animal will tell the child whether it likes or does not like the juice that the child has made. Menu items gradually increase in number as the child makes more juices the character likes to drink, and some non-fruit items are added to make the activity more difficult and interesting.

This song focuses on the phrases for saying ‘I'm hungry’ and ‘I'm thirsty’ as well as the phrases for requesting something to eat and saying thank you. The words for the different fruits and drinks are also incorporated into the song.

Children can launch the ‘Fruits’ song by tapping the Polyglots character wearing the headphones. The catchy song allows language learners to seamlessly take in the vocabulary through repetition and practice. Children learn to be attentive listeners; this type of listening is a skill that helps pronunciation and phonemic awareness.