Alphabet (Tivola) This is the best program of the year for pre-readers - and you will love it too! While most programs are content with five or six activity areas, Alphabet serves up twenty-six artistically created environments - each with its own interactive design that can be manipulated by mouse, keyboard or speaking into a microphone. The letters dance, walk, split as if in a kaleidoscope and even sometime eat each other like a pac-man. 3 & Up. Win/Mac.

Chinese Shadow Puppets (Pentewa) Pentewa Interactive Educational Software should be praised for bringing content rich software to kids, and for taking kids seriously. In the past few years there have been fewer and fewer programs that bring new content and open new windows for children. Instead, software has focused on licensed characters and arcade games. Chinese Shadow Puppet Theater starts as an introduction to the culture and artistry of Asian shadow puppetry. Then, children can design their own puppets on the computer, print them out, and create their own puppet shows off line. 7 & Up. Win/Mac.

Intel Play Digital Movie Creator (Intel)
The Intel Play Digital Movie Creator captures an amazing four minutes of video into its built-in memory - you don't need to be plugged into the computer to record. The film clips are uploaded by cable to the included, excellent video editing software, where they can be turned into movies with transitions like blends and wipes. Kids didn't mind that the quality of the images was not as high as mom and dad's camcorder; the fun was in the doing. By working with short clips that are assembled in the edit room, kids are learning the way real-world movies and TV shows are created. The Movie Creator puts unprecedented power into the hands of children. 8 & Up. Win.

Lego Mindstorm Robotic Invention System 2.0 (Lego) There is no better present you can give your kids this year than the Lego Mindstorm Robotic Invention System. Designed for tweens, the set is also fun for parent-child collaboration with younger Lego builders. As with the original set, the object is to build robots out of Legos and then program them to do different tasks with the provided software. The new sample models have been significantly improved making them much less fragile and the software has also gone through a major upgrade. 11 & Up. Win.

Monopoly Tycoon (Infogrames)
Previous versions of computerized Monopoly have been more fun to look at than to play. The computer "took care" of rolling the dice and managing the money, so they didn't require much thought and didn't offer the same educational return as the board game. Not so Monopoly Tycoon. This program takes the best bits of SimCity and Monopoly and blends them into an incredibly playable game. The railroads, Boardwalk and even the Utilities are all here, but now they are merely platforms on which you will build a merchant empire. The game works as a "real-time" sim; the pace never lets up. You'll need to build businesses that bring in revenue by day and night, movie theatres as well as grocery stores. The music and architecture change with the times as you progress from the thirties to the present during the course of each game. The game works equally well as a multiplayer or single player game. There is a significant learning curve, be sure to take the tutorial before jumping into a full game. 10 & Up. Win.

Now we move from computer software to video games. Our concern is that kids just sit and veg in front of their game platform of choice, exercising only their thumbs. Here are two games (one for Microsoft Xbox and the other for Sony Playstation 2) that get kids up and moving their whole bodies.

XBox FreeStyler Board/Amped: Amped is a snowboarding game - appropriate for days when there's not enough snow outside to do the real thing. Now you can control your XBox with the FreeStyler Board (which is about the same size as a real snowboard). You stand on it and lean from side to side to control the game. There is also a hand held controller that comes with it that vibrates when you hit something or fall down! (A similar product is available from Thrustmaster for the Playstation 2.

Britney Spears Dance Beat: (THQ) You control this Playstation 2 game with your feet by dancing on the special floor mats (from MadCatz). The animated moves were captured from Britney's dancers - even Britney was digitally measured for the game! The music is, of course, all Britney all the time...and it is fun and challenging to play for everyone in the family! Note: Adding the floor pads makes the game much harder. Although kid testers liked pretending that they were controlling the game with their feet, most had better luck using the traditional thumb controls. If your children want to use the thumb pads, encourage them to stand up and dance while playing the game!