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It has been a long time since a piece of educational software has been reviewed in Atari User, but Mickey in the Great Outdoors was well worth the wait.

Designed for children aged 7 to 10, the idea is to move Disney's Mickey Mouse along on his adventure as quickly as possible, learning as he goes.

It's always a challenge because the further Mickey advances the harder are the obstacles he must try to overcome.

The game is split into two major activities: Mickey Goes Hiking and Mickey Goes Exploring and each is split into a further two, thus making four educational topics for the player to master.

The first of the two major activities is designed to develop and reinforce essential grammar and spelling skills. This is accomplished by helping Mickey finish incomplete sentences and by creating worlds out of scrambled letters.

The second is designed to develop and improve two basic mathematical skills - equation solving and number sequencing. You must guide Mickey through this second adventure by finishing incomplete equations and completing numerical sequences in their proper order.

To load the game you must remove all cartridges from older machines and hold down the Options key on newer models while switching on. The program will load and you will be presented with the title screen.

Next comes the main menu from where you choose between the two major activities - pressing the Select keye toggles between them. At any stage during an activity you can opt out and skip to the next section. Pressing Option moves you to a sub-menu where you can make your choice.

All Mickey's actions are controlled by a joystick plugged into port one, and the fire button will make his selection. Each action is always accompanied by an animated sequence so you know exactly what has happened throughout the games.

In Mickey Goes Hiking you select a word from a group of four in order to complete a five word sentence. The missing word can be a noun, verb, adjective or adverb. By emphasising complete grammatical sentences, this helps develop effective writing and speaking skills.

The second activity involves rearranging a random pattern of four letters until they form a word. While doing this, you become familiar with the correct placement of consonants and vowels, which will help build a firm foundation for good spelling skills.

In the first activity of Mickey Goes Exploring you have to select the correct numeral or arithmetic symbol to complete an equation. This activity exercises the ability to solve problems involving addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

The second exercise - and to my mind the most difficult - challenges you to complete a logical pattern of numbers. By recognising the correct series of digits and then identifying those numbers which complete the pattern - for example, 2, 4, 6, 8, ? - you build a firm foundation for moving on to more sophisticated mathematical principles.

In the detailed menual there is a section detailing several non-computer based activities you can do with your child to further enhance their language and math skills. I found them particularly interesting and great fun when I tried them with my children.

Their favourite game is I'm Back in which I drew numbers and multiplication signs on their backs with my index finger. They had to work the answer out and write the answer on my back - great fun for the kids.

Mickey In The Great Outdoors is an excellent package. Well presented, superbly documented and, most importantly, very educational. Some of the questions asked are quite difficult, but you can get around them with a bit of parental contribution.

Because Mickey Mouse is a well-known character, children of all ages will be able to relate to him and enjoy the activities all the more.

The only minor problem is a few American spellings.