Education

Alphabet Music
A musical way to learn the ABC's

by Richard Seltzer

This is a short educational game for young children. It runs on all Atari computers and with all memory configurations.

Alphabet Music is a game that introduces preschoolers to their ABC's on a musical note. It begins with the last musical phrase from the familiar Alphabet Song (A-B-C-D-E-F-G ... ). Then the letter "A" appears. When your youngster types A, he or she will hear the note associated with A in the Alphabet Song. Then a second A appears on the screen, and the letter "B" is displayed on the line below it, prompting the player to type B and hear the B sound. If any other letter (or the [BREAK] key) is pressed, nothing happens. When you get to Z, the whole Alphabet Song is played, and the program starts over again at A.

This simple game allows a young child to obtain musical results from the keyboard at the same time that he or she learns the alphabet. It has given my three-year-old son Mikey a chance to get a turn at our busy Atari 800 and to gain a much-needed sense of control over its operations. He loves the game - and he's getting a lot better at his ABC's.

Richard Seltzer writes for Digital Equipment's company newspaper, DECWORLD. He's written several children's books, as well as an historical novel, The Name of Hero (Tarcher/Hougbton Mifflin), and recently had his first program published in a computer magazine.

5 REM ALPHABET MUSIC
6 REM BY RICHARD SELTZER
7 REM ANTIC MAGAZINE
10 L=64:X=2:Y=-l
20 OPEN #1,4,0 ,"K:"
30 GRAPHICS 2+16:GOSUB 200:RESTORE
40 L=L+1:IF L=91 THEN L=65:RESTORE
50 Y=Y+1:IF Y=ll THEN Y=0:X=X+3
60 IF X>18 THEN GRAPHICS 2+16:X=2
70 POSITION X,Y
80 ? #6;CHR$(L);
90 GET #1,K
100 POKE 16,64:POKE 53774,64
110 IF K=L THEN ? #6;CHR$(L);
120 IF K=L THEN READ A,B
130 IF K=L AND L<>87 AND L<>89 AND L<>
90 THEN SOUND 0,A,10,10:FOR I=l TO B:N
EXT I:SOUND 0,0,0,0:GOTO 40
140 IF K=L AND L=87 THEN FOR T=l TO 3:
SOUND 0,A,10,10:FOR I=l TO B:NEXT I:SO
UND 0,0,0,0:NEXT T:GOTO 40
150 IF K=L AND L=89 THEN FOR T=l TO 2 :
SOUND 0,A,10,10:FOR I=l TO B:NEXT I:SO
UND 0,0,0,0:NEXT T:GOTO 40
160 IF K=L AND L=90 THEN SOUND 0,A,10,
10:FOR I=l TO B:NEXT I:SOUND 0,0,0,0:
GOSUB 200 : GOTO 40
170 GOTO 90
180 DATA 136,100,136,100,91,100,91,100
,81,100,81,100,91,200,102,100,102,100,
108,100,108,100,121,50,121,50
190 DATA 121,50,121,50,136,200,91,100,
91,100,102,200,108,100,108,100,121,200
,91,50,102,200,108,100,121,300
200 RESTORE :FOR T=l TO ll:READ A,B:SO
UND 0,A,10,10:FOR I=1 TO B:NEXT I:SOUN
D 0,0,0,0:NEXT T
210 FOR T=l TO 2:SOUND 0,121,10,10:FOR
 I=1 TO 100:NEXT I:SOUND 0,0,0,0:NEXT T
220 SOUND 0,136,10,10:FOR I=l TO 200:N
EXT I:SOUND 0,0,0,0:RETURN

Listing: ALPHAMUS.BAS Download