About Doggies

Doggies is a no-ads, dog-breed-naming game for children aged 4 to 7. We show a real photograph of a dog at the top of the screen — a Labrador, a pug, a dalmatian, a beagle — and put four breed names below it. Your child taps the name that matches the picture. Get it right, score a star. Endless turns, no fail state, gentle pace.

Doggies is part of the Tadpole Games family. Where Fredle teaches phonics and Flagle introduces the world’s countries, Doggies introduces the dogs we meet every day — one breed at a time. It pairs a real photograph with the breed name, so a pre-reader can match by picture and an early reader can sound the word out. The breeds are drawn from The Kennel Club’s recognised list.

Who Doggies is for

• Reception (age 4–5) — just starting to put names to the dogs they meet in the park, on the street, at a friend’s house. Two of the four names are usually easy to rule out, so the child still gets to think and pick.
• Year 1 (age 5–6) — building vocabulary and noticing how breeds differ. Learning that the little spotty one is a dalmatian, and the long low one is a dachshund.
• Year 2 (age 6–7) — ready for the trickier breeds (weimaraner, vizsla, schnauzer) and starting to spot a breed from its shape and coat.
• Home-schoolers, tutors and grandparents who want a five-minute animal warm-up with no ads and no fuss.

How it works

• A real photograph of a dog appears at the top of the screen.
• Four breed names sit in a 2×2 grid below.
• Your child taps the name that matches the picture. Little spotty white dog → dalmatian.
• Right answer? The tile flashes green, a star is added, and a brand new dog flips into place.
• Wrong answer? The tile wobbles red and stays struck-through; the picture stays put, and they can try one of the other three. Endless turns — no losing.

Why a real photograph (not a drawing)

Children learn to recognise dogs in the world from photographs faster than they do from cartoon drawings, because the colours, coat and shape of a real dog are what they’ll see on a walk. Every Doggies photo is a real photograph sourced from Wikimedia Commons under a Creative Commons licence — the same open library that encyclopaedias use.

That ordering matters. Picture-recognition comes first; the word comes second; the joy of spotting the same breed on a real walk comes third — said by the grown-up alongside. By the time your child can read “Labrador”, they already know what a Labrador looks like, and what a pug looks like, and how to tell them apart.

How to play with your child

• Say the breed name aloud each round. “That’s a Labrador. They’re friendly and love to swim. Look at the floppy ears.” Repetition is the lesson.
• Talk about what each breed is like. “Greyhounds run very fast.” “Collies help farmers round up sheep.” “Huskies pull sleds in the snow.”
• Spot them on walks. Doggies works best as the indoor half of a habit — the other half is “ooh look, a pug” on the way to school.
• Relate it to something they know. “Next door’s dog is one of these — it’s a cocker spaniel.”
• Five minutes a day. Short and warm beats long and earnest. The stars only go up.

Frequently asked questions

Can my child fail?

No. There is no timer, no lives, and no fail state. A wrong tap just gives a gentle wobble — the picture stays in place and they can try one of the other names. Stars only go up.

Which dog breeds does Doggies cover?

Doggies starts with the breeds a UK child is most likely to meet on a walk or at a friend’s house, and unlocks more as they earn stars:

• Tier 1 — from the first round. Eight favourites: Labrador, golden retriever, German shepherd, pug, dalmatian, border collie, chihuahua, beagle.
• Tier 2 — unlocks at 3 stars. Eight more familiar breeds: cocker spaniel, boxer, dachshund, bulldog, French bulldog, poodle, rottweiler, husky.
• Tier 3 — unlocks at 10 stars. Eight popular breeds: Jack Russell, whippet, greyhound, pomeranian, shih tzu, West Highland terrier, staffie, border terrier.
• Tier 4 — unlocks at 22 stars. Eight big and gentle breeds: great dane, saint bernard, bernese mountain dog, newfoundland, samoyed, akita, basset hound, bichon frise.
• Tier 5 — unlocks at 40 stars. Eight challenge breeds for Year 2: weimaraner, vizsla, shar pei, schnauzer, afghan hound, irish wolfhound, bloodhound, papillon.

Each new tier comes with a small celebration so your child knows new breeds have appeared. Stars only go up — the tiers do not reset on a wrong answer.

What if my child can’t read yet?

That’s the right age to start. Doggies uses only four answers per round, two of which a parent can quickly rule out by size or colour. A wrong tap is welcome — it’s how the matching click happens. Read each name aloud the first few times; by the tenth round your child will be tracking the word on the tile, not just the picture.

More from Tadpole Games

• Kitties — the same game for cat breeds: a real photo of a cat, four breed names, tap the right one.
• Fredle — a daily phonics word puzzle for UK children aged 4 to 7.
• Name the Flower — the same game for garden flowers.
• Flagle — tap the flag that matches the famous landmark in the middle.

Photo credits

Every Doggies photograph is a real image from Wikimedia Commons, used under a Creative Commons licence (CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA) or in the public domain. Per-photo attribution is recorded in /doggies/CREDITS.txt in the source repository. Thank you to the Wikimedia community for putting these photographs into the commons.