Discovery

World of Whales CD-ROM, Teramedia, $89.95

This CD-ROM package from the Auckland company Terabyte Interactive has won a number of international awards for electronic educational packages. It provides a stimulating, entertaining and interesting insight into the world of these popular creatures.

It is ideal for use in classrooms or at home and is an interesting, interactive way for young people to learn about these popular creatures. To help maintain the users' interest, the CD makes valuable use of sound, both of the whale variety and human, as well as colourful graphics and some games. The whole package is an excellent example of the power that electronic learning resources have when combining text, graphics, animation, video and sound that cannot easily be done by other means. The content level would best suit primary to junior high school students.

The material covered includes whale biology, social interactions, distribution and migration, as well as information on the whales' world under the water. Environmental issues and human interactions with whales are explored, along with whale-related myths and legends.

This production is a valuable education resource that has managed to combine quality production with fascinating content. An added bonus is that it operates on both Macintosh and Windows systems.

Greg Walker, NZSM