About FlockTots
Cooperative games — where everyone works toward one shared goal instead of racing to beat each other — are one of the great modern board-game ideas, and one of the best-evidenced for young children (cooperative play is linked to less aggression and more helping). FlockTots brings it to ages 3–5: Puddle the duck and Hopps the frog help every duckling waddle home to Cattail’s reeds before Rusk the fox creeps too close.
You win together
There is one shared goal (get every duckling home) and one shared danger (Rusk creeps a step closer each round). You and Hopps take turns to waddle a duckling across or shoo Rusk back — and you either make it together or try again together. No one loses to a friend.
Hopps helps — but never does it all (the “Team Rule”)
Hopps always takes a fair turn — helping a duckling across, or shooing Rusk when he’s close — but never carries the whole game. Sometimes Hopps even waits for you. That’s the quiet lesson: a good teammate helps, but leaves room for you to help too.
Game weight (measured, not asserted)
We follow one rule across the library: a game’s weight is measured, never guessed. The pips below come from letting the computer play FlockTots hundreds of times and counting how many choices a turn it holds and how long a round runs — so a grown-up can pick by how much the child has to keep in their head.
Measured over 200 self-play games: about 2.0 choices a turn, ~8 turns long.
What it’s good for (and what we don’t claim)
FlockTots is gentle practice for cooperation, turn-taking, and working toward a shared goal. It is not a curriculum or a brain-training app, and we make no claim it raises IQ or test scores.
Safe by design
- On your device. Nothing is sent anywhere; no account, no sign-in.
- Gentle. No timer, no streak, no score to chase — and you never lose to a friend.
- Audio-first, big buttons. Made for a pre-reader to play — hear what happens, tap big targets.