[senco-forum] nessy learning programme

This is well discussed on the forum, but I know the archives can be tricky to access. Try using this link. http://lists.becta.org.uk/pipermail/senco-forum/
I do like Nessy, but you do need to think how and what you want to use a programme for. Children in groups? in classroom, with support? independently?
Nessy is great to provide variety, and you get loads of card/ worksheets games as well. However....
The card games and sheets are very repetitative.
Nessy cannot be "locked down" like wordshark to limit access to certain games and wordlists
You cannot view children's errors etc like you can in wordshark
The games are more fun/better graphics than wordshark, but less time is spent actually reading /spelling.
Nessy has far fewer games than Wordshark, although the Nessy games are great fun I have found kids get bored with some of them, very quickly, particularly at the lower levels. In contrast there are so many games in wordshark that, although kids dont like certain games, they can always find another.
I had wordshark, and found Nessy well worth the money as an addition - as much for the phonic card games/sheets as the computer games.
But...I would always want wordshark first....
(can I have my commision now Rik!)
Kate

----- Original Message ----
From: Ruth Wilkinson <ruth at ruthwilkinson.f9.co.uk>
To: senco-forum new <senco-forum at lists.becta.org.uk>
Sent: Thursday, 13 September, 2007 5:27:23 PM
Subject: [senco-forum] nessy learning programme

Has anyone used the Nessy Learning programme?  The demo disc looks good and it would be nice to have an alternative to Wordshark but I'd like to be sure it's worth it before I try to persuade the head to buy it.

Ruth W