- There's a new Settings option Shuffle Cards. If you turn this on, then the 4 cards to match on each page appear swapped around randomly each time the page appears. This will now stretch those children who are remembering the position of each card!
- In previous versions, tapping or swiping before each card to match appeared could allow children to guess ahead. Now these gestures are ignored until the card appears, encouraging waiting to perform tasks in order.
- The padlock button now has to be held for 3 seconds to have any effect (as is already the case in Special Stories). Also, when locked, the buttons to move to the first or last page are now disabled. Together, these should make it less likely that children's fingers will move the game away from the task in hand.
- When importing a Word List, the option to add as a new profile now appears at the top of the list, instead of being hidden at the bottom. Also, if you choose to replace an existing profile there's an extra confirmation prompt, so you can avoid accidentally replacing the wrong profile if you tap it by mistake.
- Previous versions had a bug that meant that even if editing had been disabled in the Settings app, it was still possible to delete words or profiles by swiping across them. This is now prevented unless editing is enabled.
- When using UK English, the word yogurt is now spelled yoghurt, to match the paper See and Learn resources.
We're also working towards a new version of Special Stories. This will also have several improvements:
- Support for organising stories into Collections. This will work rather similarly to the existing Profiles facility in Special Words. So you could, for instance, have a collection entitled Holidays or Vacations, and another called School. If working with more than one child on the same device, you can give each child their own collection of stories. Import and export, which previously transferred one story at a time, can now also be used to transfer a whole collection in one go.
- A story can now have a different title to the text on the first page. You can also now enter the author's name, copyright details and additional notes for a story, and notes for a collection.
- It's now possible to have pages without picture or text (or both).
- Previous versions had a bug that meant that even if editing had been disabled in the Settings app, it was still possible to delete stories or pages by swiping across them. This is now prevented unless editing is enabled.
- When printing a story, or emailing as a PDF, each page now has a header and footer, including the story title and page number, and any author and copyright details.
- When importing a story or collection, the option to add as a new one now appears at the top of the list, instead of being hidden at the bottom. Also, if you choose to replace an existing one there's an extra confirmation prompt, so you can avoid accidentally replacing the wrong story or collection if you tap it by mistake.
- We have added Croatian, Dutch and Turkish translations.
Please keep telling us how you are using our apps: we love to hear your stories and see your photos and videos.