Wellesley, Massachusetts – Tired of learning a second language with memorization, flash cards, or rote learning? The Gabbler app, newly released by LadeezFirstMedia, helps kids and young adults learn real-life usable Mandarin Chinese conversational skills within a fun, gamified interface. Originally launched as a Kickstarter-funded project entitled iZhongWen, Gabbler has been reborn with new graphics and two new game playing modes.
Gabbler is the answer to young people’s need for beautiful graphic interfaces that make learning fun. Kids are presented with a menu where they can choose which character to ‘travel’ with (a girl or a boy), a mode of play (read the written pinyin phonetic transcription of Chinese, or hanyu, simplified Chinese characters, or simply listen to sentences), the type of game to play, and one of five lessons.
Game choices include a Quiz Show multiple-choice format, a Word Rain game where sentences fall from the sky, and a Magic Zap game where the user can match question to answer and try to transform a caterpillar into a butterfly at the same time. Gabbler helps the student read pinyin, as well as learn new characters in the context of real-life scenarios such as going to a restaurant, going to school, and going shopping. For an extra challenge, in ‘listen’ mode, the student can simply listen to a sentence and choose the right response. English translations are always available to help the student along.
Students can watch ‘frequent Gabblers’ on a leaderboard and track their own progress as they improve their conversational skills.
Best of all, after earning 100% on a lesson, the student is allowed to download a specially-designed printable page with representations of the Gabbler family and their surroundings to print out, cut out and turn into a paper village. These printables are designed specially for Gabbler by Tim Haugen of myFantastictoys.
Device Requirements:
* iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch
* Requires iOS 5.1 or later
* : 16.1 MB
Pricing and Availability:
Gabbler 1.0 is $1.99 USD (or equivalent amount in other currencies) and available worldwide through the App Store in the Education category. Gabbler is designed for kids ages 9-11 to reinforce Chinese language learning. It includes no ads or in-app purchases. It is also available on Nook, Amazon and Android.
LadeezFirstMedia
Gabbler 1.0
Purchase and Download (iOS)
Purchase and Download (Google Play)
YouTube Video (Trailer)
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LadeezFirstMedia was founded by Jen Looper, Boston Ambassador for Corona SDK and prolific apps developer, in 2010. Jen cofounded the Wellesley Chinese Language School and the Wellesley Code Academy and is passionate about creating quality software for kids and families. Copyright (C) 2013 LadeezFirstMedia. All Rights Reserved. Apple, the Apple logo, iPhone, iPad, iPad mini, iPod touch, and Mac are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. Other trademarks and registered trademarks may be the property of their respective owners.