A M Y ' S F I R S T P R I M E R
Six delightful programs will give your
child a head start in school, teaching
the alphabet
numbers
shapes
colors
counting
matching
pattern recognition
and problem solving.
Recommended for ages 4-8.
Requires an IBM PC, XT, or PCjr
with 128K RAM, BASICA, color display or TV,
IBM color graphics adapter or EGA graphics adapter.
(Does not work with Hercules Monochrome Graphics Adapter)
Authors: Rob, Garth, and John Robinson
Copyright 1985, Computing Specialties
Orange City, IA 51041
AMY'S FIRST PRIMER
Table of Contents
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Starting Amy's First Primer. . . . . 2
Stopping Amy's First Primer. . . . . 3
The Keyboard . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
The Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
The ABC Song . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Beary Fun Letters. . . . . . . . . . 6
Bunny Letters. . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Beary Fun Counting . . . . . . . . . 8
Help the Froggy. . . . . . . . . . . 9
Load the Truck . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Preparing a New Disk . . . . . . . . 11
AMY'S FIRST PRIMER
INTRODUCTION
Programs for young children are hard to find. They
must be extremely simple to use, very colorful and
attractive, and they need to be fun and free of nega-
tive rewards. Our own five year old Amy wouldn't
spend five minutes with the programs her older
brothers enjoyed. She didn't like the idea of
destroying things or being destroyed. In addition to
being frustrated with the family computer, Amy's
birthday came on September 8, forcing her to wait
almost a year longer than some of her friends before
going to kindergarten.
Amy's First Primer was written by her father and
brothers to help her work on the things her kinder-
garten friends were doing. After much testing and
reprogramming, the programs finally met Amy's full
approval. We think your child will approve, too.
Page 1
STARTING AMY'S FIRST PRIMER
If the disk is brand new, you should make a backup
copy of the disk first for your own protection and
then use that disk. The section at the end of this
guide on "Preparing a New Disk" will help you make a
backup copy of the disk and place the DOS operating
system on it. Steps 1 and 2 below will only work if
you have made a new disk with DOS on it. Step 3 below
will work even on the original disk.
You may use one of the following steps to start Amy's
disk:
1. If the computer power is off, just put Amy's disk
in drive A and turn the power on.
or
2. If the power is already on, put Amy's disk in
drive A and press the keys CTRL, ALT, and DEL
simultaneously, causing a warm boot.
or
3. If you just want to see how the original disk
works, Place a DOS disk with BASICA.COM in
drive A and boot the system. Then place Amy's
disk in drive B: and type:
B:
A:BASICA START
Page 2
STOPPING AMY'S FIRST PRIMER
To quit playing with Amy's disk, perform one of the
following:
1. Take the disk out and turn the computer off.
or
2. Press <CTRL/Break> and then type SYSTEM.
THE KEYBOARD
There are a few important keys to learn for Amy's
First Primer:
ARROW KEYS - Used for moving objects on the screen.
Up, down, right or left.
ENTER - or RETURN - used in the menu program to call
up the program that the arrow is pointing to.
ESC - Used at any time in any of the six
programs to quit and return to the menu.
The behavior of the keys has been modified to suit the
expectations that young children have. When an arrow
key is pressed, an object will move and continue to
move until the key is released, then it will stop
immediately.
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THE MENU
The menu displays the six titles for the programs
along with pictures that will help your child
recognize the programs. Select a program by pressing
the up or down arrow keys until the big blue arrow
is pointing to the desired program, then press the
ENTER key to run the program. The program titles are:
ABC Song
Beary Fun Letters
Bunny Letters
Beary Fun Counting
Help the Froggy
Load the Truck
If your child is just beginning to learn the alphabet,
we suggest that you start with the ABC Song and move
from there to Beary Fun Letters and Bunny Letters.
The ABC Song will help to associate the letters with
the pictures.
Beary Fun Counting is used for number recognition and
counting. Help the Froggy is a delightful maze for
problem solving, and Load the Truck is used for
pattern recognition and matching.
To quit playing with Amy's disk, perform one of the
following:
1. Take the disk out and turn the computer off.
or
2. Press <CTRL/BREAK> and then type SYSTEM.
Page 4
THE ABC SONG
The purpose of the ABC Song is to help associate the
pictures with the letters. The program will play the
song over and over again, until the ESC key is
pressed. All other keys are ignored. The ESC key
will stop the song, and bring the menu back.
Sing along with your child the first few times. Even
if your child already knows the ABC Song, she or he
will start recognizing the individual letters as they
are displayed. I can remember wondering what an
"eleminopee" was when I first started singing the ABC
song. Since a new picture is displayed with each
letter, your child will actually start to realize that
l, m, n, o and p are separate letters.
Page 5
BEARY FUN LETTERS
Beary Fun Letters is used for learning the keyboard
and the printed letters. The program starts by
displaying a picture on the screen. It then waits
until the proper key is pressed on the keyboard. The
proper key will be the first letter of the picture
name in all cases. The picture names are:
Apple Jug Snail
Boat Kite Truck
Car Ladder Umbrella
Diamond Moon Violin
Elephant Number Nine Wagon
Fish Owl Xylophone
Girl Peanut Yo-yo
Hat Queen Zebra
Ice cream Ring
If the key isn't pressed after four seconds, the
program will display both the lower and upper case
form of the letter on the screen. It will continue to
wait until the key is pressed. When the proper key is
pressed, a happy bear face is placed on the border of
the screen. When the border is full, the game is over
and the ABC song will be played. The game will then
be repeated. The ESC key may be pressed at anytime to
return to the menu.
You can help a lot, the first few times your child
plays this game by saying the picture name and the
first letter out loud. For example, if a wagon is
displayed, say "Wagon - W" and then help find the
letter W on the keyboard.
Page 6
BUNNY LETTERS
Bunny Letters is a matching game. It places four
pictures on the left side of the screen and four
letters (both lower and upper case) on the right side.
The letters are not in the same order as the pictures.
A bunny is placed next to the top picture.
Use the arrow keys to move the bunny up, down, left or
right toward the corresponding letter. When the bunny
reaches the proper letter, a blue line is drawn from
the picture to the letter and the bunny is placed on
the right side of the screen.
A new bunny will be placed beside the next picture.
When all pictures have been matched with their
letters, a special bunny is placed at the top of the
screen to indicate that a set of four matches has been
completed. The screen is then erased and a new set of
four matches are displayed. When five sets of matches
are played, the game is over and the ABC song is
played.
The ESC key may be pressed at anytime to return to the
menu.
Page 7
BEARY FUN COUNTING
Beary Fun Counting works the same as Beary Fun
Letters, except that it displays a set of fruit on
the screen for the child to count. It then waits
patiently until the child presses the proper number.
When the proper key is pressed, a happy bear face is
placed on the border of the screen. When the border
is full, the game is over and a congratulations
message is displayed. The game will then be repeated.
The ESC key may be pressed at any time to return to
the menu.
Page 8
HELP THE FROGGY
This is a hungry frog and she needs help finding her
way to the lily pad. Use the arrow keys to guide her
through the maze to the lily pad. Once on the lily
pad, the frog is ready for dinner. There's usually a
fly buzzing close by and frogs love flies. Each maze
takes approximately one minute to generate, and since
each one is built using a random number generator,
there will be a new, unique maze each time.
The song "Froggy Went a Courting" will be played while
a new maze is being built.
Help the Froggy will be repeated until the ESC key is
pressed to return to the menu.
Page 9
LOAD THE TRUCK
Children have always liked playing with trucks and
loaders, and Load the Truck is no exception. The top
right corner of the screen contains an order for four
shapes. Use the arrow keys to guide the loader around
the screen. The truck must be loaded so that it shows
the same pattern as the order form.
Load the Truck is a carefully designed simulation.
Just like the other programs, it never scolds the
child or even complains about finding the wrong shape.
It patiently waits until the loader scoop reaches the
bottom of the right shape. It then raises the hoist,
picking up the shape. Patience again is the rule,
until the loader reaches the edge of the trailer.
Then the loader slides the shape onto the truck and
lowers the hoist, ready for finding a new shape. All
that the child has to do is use the arrow keys to
guide the loader to the right spots in the proper
sequence. When all four shapes are on the truck, the
loader must be moved back up the screen, so that it
will be out of the way for the tractor. As soon as
the loader is out of the way, the tractor will back up
and haul the load away.
Load the Truck will be repeated until the ESC key is
pressed to return to the menu. A new random order
is generated for each game.
Page 10
PREPARING A NEW DISK
Your first job with Amy's disk should be to make a
backup copy of the disk. Just follow these steps.
The steps assume that your PC has two floppy drives.
1. Put a write protect tab on Amy's disk, so that any
mistake in the steps below will not destroy it.
2. Put a DOS system disk in drive A and boot the
system.
3. When the "A>" prompt appears, type the command:
FORMAT/S B:
4. The program will ask you to
Insert new diskette for drive B:
and strike any key when ready
Make sure that it's asking you to put the disk in
drive B:, then put a new blank disk in drive B:.
and pick a key to press.
5. After the disk is formatted, it will ask you:
Format another (Y/N)?
Press the letter N to return to the "A>" prompt.
6. Now type the command:
COPY A:BASICA.COM B:
Page 11
7. Remove the DOS disk from drive A: and place the
original disk for Amy's First Primer in drive A:.
Now type the command:
COPY A:*.* B:
7. When all files are copied, your disk will be ready.
It contains both DOS and Amy's First Primer.
8. To test your new disk, place it in drive A: and
reboot the system by pressing the CTRL-ALT-DEL
keys simultaneously. The program should display
an introductory screen and go on to the main menu.
If it doesn't, try this process again.
Page 12
USER SUPPORT
Amy's First Primer is a user-supported "shareware"
program. You may copy it for free and share it with
your friends on a "try before you buy" basis. If you
or your child like the programs, and find them useful,
we request that you purchase a license to the program
by sending $15.00 to:
Rob Robinson
523 Albany Avenue NE
Orange City, IA 51041
In appreciation, we'll send you another free disk (and
the license to use it) containing the DRAW program
that was used for the graphics on Amy's disk. The
DRAW program provides all 4 colors and two palettes on
the screen. Commands available for the DRAW program are
Draw, Erase, Circle, Box, Line, Jump, Fill, Get, Put,
Input, Output, Report, Foreground color, Background
color, Wipe, and Quit. DRAW doesn't require a joy-
stick, mouse, or lightpen. All drawing is done with
the keyboard. The complete listable source code is
included as well as some example game programs which
show how to take graphics created by DRAW and use them
in your own game programs.
If you wish to only purchase a license to Amy's First
Primer without the DRAW program, please send $10.00 to
the above address.
Thank you.
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