"The Vowel A" teaches viewers about the short and long sounds of the vowel letter A. It explains how the presence of a final 'e' at the end of words changes the sound of A from short to long. Through ...

PURPLE WIZARD: Oh, what is this thing? ORANGE WIZARD: That’s the letter ‘s’. It makes the ‘s’ sound. Join the phonics wizards and learn all about the sounds ‘s’, ‘a’, ‘t’ and ‘p’.

We know that many children are failing to learn to read in our nation’s classrooms. So it’s tempting to hope that tutoring by artificial intelligence could provide a solution. But how close are we to ...