Zoo Tycoon

I have talked about this game before but I have to sing it some praises again today. Sophie has loved Zoo Tycoon for years and she never seems to tire of it. It was the game that pushed her to learn to read because we kept telling her she needed to be able to read what the zookeepers said in order to play. That was years ago and she is still playing this game often and is quite the expert at it now.
The last few weeks as we have been studying biomes she has come up with a new element or limit to her game. And of course she insists it is for school. She came up with the idea of making a zoo with exhibit and animals that belong to the biome we are studying. So last week is was all about polar animals, walrus, orca, penguins, and of course polar bears.
This week our studies are leading us to the grasslands so Sophie has been building a zoo with all the savanna animals. She has lions, giraffe, ostridge, zebra, Kangaroo and elephants along with a bunch of others. She hasn't quite figured out the prairie animals yet, but I am sure before we move on she will find some of these animals to put in her zoo too.
She even knows which of the dinosaurs she can put in that like the same kind of terrain and foliage so she allows a few dinosaurs to hatch in her zoo as well, but only if they fit the biome we are studying.
My girl has certainly learned a lot from this simple computer game. And she finds all sorts of reasons to play it. She loves to tell me it is for school and that I should let her have more time. One hour a day is all she is allowed to play. I really try to keep her time to that hour but sometime it I forget to set the timer and she gets some extra time. Especially if the boys are also in there watching her build her zoo. When all is quiet and no one is fighting it is easy to let the time slip by.