Tiny Ocean Review

Tiny Ocean is a lovely interactive ocean themed app, both fun and educational. Starting out on a tropical island, tap various objects such as the sun, ball, or sand castle and watch as they move around the screen, listening to the noises that they make. When finished with dry land, scroll down into the ocean, ultimately landing on the ocean’s floor, tapping various sea life as you go. The music playing in the background of this app is perfect - relaxing and beautiful, I especially like the use of the calypso drum, adding to the tropical feel of this application.

Sea-themed Interactive Flash Cards are included where parents or kids can record their own voices reading the flash cards, aiding in reading, pronunciation, speaking skills, as well as general creativity as these recording can later be used as the soundtrack of the different sea creatures being tapped.

My son (2.5+ years) had a lot of silly fun making his own recordings, and I am surprised how much I enjoy listening to his little voice say words like “Octopus” or “Submarine.”

This would be a great app for babies to teach cause and effect from the tapping, and older kids will enjoy hearing themselves as they make their own recordings. I like that Spanish and Greek translations are included in the Flash Card section, but I wish I could adjust the volume of the recorded and music tracks separately, and I would like to see the prompt moment be longer before one records. Also, we were not able to record over the coconuts, something that I hope could be looked at for a future update.

Although great for many ages, parents may find themselves playing back their child’s recordings on their own for their own pleasure. I know I do. This app has become like a keep-sake of how my son speaks at 2.5+ years and has become very precious to me.