This time I have decided to concentrate on reviews of some of the many new items of educational software that are published each month. Each is distinguished in some way by its usefulness to teachers, or by breadth of application.

Product: Miscue Analysis
Supplier: MRH Systems and Software, 20 Highfield Road, Kidderminster, Worcestershire DY10 2TL
Price: £15.00

Some ideas are so simple that you wonder why they have not been implemented before. Just such an idea obviously inspired the suite of programs on this disc. Surprisingly little use is made of 'Expert Systems' in education, but here are two programs that mimic expert systems and are based on sound educational principles.

The first 'diagnoses' on-screen the miscues (not mistakes) that children (of all ages and abilities) can make when reading. Firstly, record the miscues as they occur: with the excellent documentation there is a specially prepared sheet for this purpose. Then you are lead through a hierarchical, tree-like description with simple causes and remedies suggested for each type of miscue. These are comprehensive and clear.

Further, a file of the analyses and dates arrived at by this process (on up to 30 children on each data disc) can be stored and/or added to later. This data also contains type-counts for each child, and as such can make the task of class record keeping much easier. Given the increasing importance attached to record keeping, there is now no excuse where reading is concerned!

Printed output is available at all suitable points, as well as easy selection (by menu) of disc surfaces, etc. I have always suspected that programs that make teachers' lives easier are a sure-fire success. This one should be too!

Next a comparison of two Statistics packages:

These statistical packages will attract two different sets of users: firstly the teachers of maths and statistics, or indeed any other subject (like geography), where manipulation and presentation of data is relevant; and secondly the professional use by teachers, academics and lecturers for the purpose of educational research.

Age-ranges: Statspak is aimed at those covering 'O', GCSE and 'A' level syllabi, but would he suitable as introductory material for younger users (a pre-'O' level environmental project for example). Scigraf is probably better suited to students at a higher level. The documentation for the latter is superior, fuller, and with more of a tutorial flavour. Potential buyers, however, will want to know which functions each package can handle and how well.

Chalksoft's package can handle mean, mode, median, variance, standard deviation, standard error of the mean, coefficients (variation and skewness), frequency distribution, quartiles and interquartile and semi-interquartile ranges on single and multiple sets of numbers. Both regressions of x and y, and Pearson, Spearman and Kendall's Coefficients as well as CHI square. Although the displays are not always easy to read, there is a built-in Epson dump to produce hard copy of the various displays (e.g. frequency polygon, scatter graph or histogram etc).

Although instructions to swap discs at appropriate points are clear, and the saving, retrieving and managing of data on the disc reliable, there are some grumbles (scaling on scatter diagrams for instance, and the impossibility of comparing two distributions simultaneously). A major disappointment lies in the way numbers are entered, a dot disappearing for each one with no indication or trapping of impossibly long sequences of digits. The copy cursor is not trapped, and the displays are generally less than ideal. This points to the need to use this package under close teacher supervision.

This is more concerned with plotting than the pure handling of statistics. It handles plotting with linear, as well as logarithmic x and y, normal distribution and log-normal distribution curves. The data on which these graphs are based is held in common databases on disc, and transferring between them in any order is easy. As with Statspak, there are some good examples on disc. Scaling is automatic (with log too), but data can also be plotted to scales of the user's own choice. There is no theoretical limit to the amount of data that can be handled, and it can be displayed as points, lines, broken lines or bar-charts.

The calculation of formulae is automatic and speedy, and for those with an Epson compatible printer there is an in-built dump routine. Additionally, graph plots can be saved as files for further use in other environments. There is an almost exemplary 'technical appendix' which contains sections on trouble-shooting, transfer to ADFS, possible sideways ROM clashes etc. The appendix does give examples of use and adaptation (by Basic programs for editing large data files for instance). It also outlines some of the mathematical theory on which the package is based.

From this it will be obvious that Scigraf is the more specialised package. If you want to display or demonstrate polynomials or correlations, either for their own sake or related to project work, then this is for you. If it's heavier number-crunching, and you can put up with the minor irritations mentioned above, try Statspak.

Product: Muddles Supplier: Software Production Associates, PO Box 59, Leamington Spa, Warwicks CV31 3QA. Tel: (0926) 22959 Price: £13.80

Muddles is a language development program for all ages. It is suitable for infant and primary classrooms, middle and some lower secondary schools and in special needs departments anywhere. Additionally it could be used in modern language departments in colleges, universities and in adult literacy work." What a claim!

It displays colourful, clear, mode 7 text in short chunks - typically eight or ten words - which is muddled in one or more ways. All the vowels might be missing, the spaces might have been omitted, or the words may appear in reverse or in reverse order, etc.

The aim is then to make sense of the line by entering your version: if you don't get it from one 'muddled' version, another will help you, while any correct letters stay put. Control via space-bar and cursor keys is unusually easy. You can readily alter the level of difficulty too. The way that "Muddles" expects the user to make sense is by meaning, not decoding.

The package thus takes account of theories of reading that now (thankfully) have preference over phonic reading schemes. The whole feeling is right and assumes children are ABLE, enthusiastic people keen to learn. With this package - they will. Worth buying.