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Detailed Description of Say Say Oh Playmate

There are six contexts within Say Say Oh Playmate: Neighborhood Overview, Leaf Area, Clap Screen, Playground, Writing Area, and Recording Room. See the various activities within these six contexts below.

In the Neighborhood Overview, students are introduced to "Sam," their helper, and given their assignment of teaching clap-routines to two young neighborhood girls. Students are also able to decide the activity they want to work on from this screen.

In the Reconstruct Lyrics Area, students are responsible reconstructing the entire lyrics to song, one line at a time. To help the student on constructing the lyrics, Sam will sing the song, the students version of the song, check the students work, and provide context clues based on proven word recognition strategies and the student prior history of using the system.

In the Create Clap-routine Area students are responsible for construction the correct clap-routine sequence. To help the student, Sam will clap the correct routine, the student’s routine, provide hints on individual claps, and check the student’s work. This activity is designed to help students understand symbols and patterns.

Since clap-routines are often regional in nature, we can not expect all students to know the same version of a clap-routine. To help students learn the versions used in Say, Say Oh Playmate, students can elect to practice a clap-routine with Sam in the Practice Clap-routine Area. Students can control how fast or slow Sam claps. This area is design to reflect as closely as possible the social environment in which children traditionally learn clap-routines, one-on-one.

In the Girls’ Performance Area, students are able to see the two animated characters perform the routine. The two girls are only able to perform the parts of the routine that they have been taught. Thus, if a student has only taught the girls how to sing the first line of Miss Mary Mack that is all the girls will sing. If the girls have been taught how to sing and clap the first stanza of Miss Mary Mack then the student will be able to hear and see the girls sing and clap the first stanza. The performance area serves as both a motivator and feedback mechanism.

While a major component of Say Say Oh Playmate focuses on students improving early literacy skills by reconstructing familiar and predictable texts, an equally important component of the system is the Write a New Song Area. Here, students are given the task of creating an original clap-routine. Students first choose an existing clap-routine as a template to provide both a writing template and a recording rhythm. Students then have the option of writing their song from scratch or choosing of changing some of the words in their template song. To help students in writing their song a dictionary of 1400 words each containing a definition, example sentence, rhyming words and similar words is provided.

In the Record a Song Area, students record themselves singing their original song. Since the song uses the rhythm template of an existing song, the system is able to highlight the words of the students song when they should be sung to help the child sing the song correctly. Students are able to record their song until they feel they have it correct.

After recording the song, students are taken back to the Construct a Clap-routine Area to create an original clap-routine for their song. Students are able to see their routine performed in the performance area by the two girls. Students will see the lyrics to their song, hear their recording and see the girls clap their routine.

To strengthen the connections between Say Say Oh Playmate and students real life playing of clap-routines, students are able to print out their clap-routines to share with friends, publish their clap-routines to a Say Say Oh Playmate website and download clap-routines created by other student into their Say Say Oh Playmate program.

Detailed Description of Say Say Oh Playmate There are six contexts within Say Say Oh Playmate: Neighborhood Overview, Leaf Area, Clap Screen, Playground, Writing Area, and Recording Room. See the various activities within these six contexts below.
	In the Neighborhood Overview, students are introduced to "Sam," their helper, and given their assignment of teaching clap-routines to two young neighborhood girls. Students are also able to decide the activity they want to work on from this screen.
	In the Reconstruct Lyrics Area, students are responsible reconstructing the entire lyrics to song, one line at a time. To help the student on constructing the lyrics, Sam will sing the song, the students version of the song, check the students work, and provide context clues based on proven word recognition strategies and the student prior history of using the system.
	In the Create Clap-routine Area students are responsible for construction the correct clap-routine sequence. To help the student, Sam will clap the correct routine, the student’s routine, provide hints on individual claps, and check the student’s work. This activity is designed to help students understand symbols and patterns.
	Since clap-routines are often regional in nature, we can not expect all students to know the same version of a clap-routine. To help students learn the versions used in Say, Say Oh Playmate, students can elect to practice a clap-routine with Sam in the Practice Clap-routine Area. Students can control how fast or slow Sam claps. This area is design to reflect as closely as possible the social environment in which children traditionally learn clap-routines, one-on-one.
	In the Girls’ Performance Area, students are able to see the two animated characters perform the routine. The two girls are only able to perform the parts of the routine that they have been taught. Thus, if a student has only taught the girls how to sing the first line of Miss Mary Mack that is all the girls will sing. If the girls have been taught how to sing and clap the first stanza of Miss Mary Mack then the student will be able to hear and see the girls sing and clap the first stanza. The performance area serves as both a motivator and feedback mechanism.
	While a major component of Say Say Oh Playmate focuses on students improving early literacy skills by reconstructing familiar and predictable texts, an equally important component of the system is the Write a New Song Area. Here, students are given the task of creating an original clap-routine. Students first choose an existing clap-routine as a template to provide both a writing template and a recording rhythm. Students then have the option of writing their song from scratch or choosing of changing some of the words in their template song. To help students in writing their song a dictionary of 1400 words each containing a definition, example sentence, rhyming words and similar words is provided.
	In the Record a Song Area, students record themselves singing their original song. Since the song uses the rhythm template of an existing song, the system is able to highlight the words of the students song when they should be sung to help the child sing the song correctly. Students are able to record their song until they feel they have it correct.
After recording the song, students are taken back to the Construct a Clap-routine Area to create an original clap-routine for their song. Students are able to see their routine performed in the performance area by the two girls. Students will see the lyrics to their song, hear their recording and see the girls clap their routine. To strengthen the connections between Say Say Oh Playmate and students real life playing of clap-routines, students are able to print out their clap-routines to share with friends, publish their clap-routines to a Say Say Oh Playmate website and download clap-routines created by other student into their Say Say Oh Playmate program.