In Slate, Michael Agger writes about how the “wooden-toy crowd” is embracing the iPhone as a device for toddlers:

Most parents try to walk a more subtle, self-serving path: seeking out “educational” apps. Developers are on to us—there is a lot of kiddie crap lurking in the iTunes store. You pay 99 cents for some “Farm” app that turns out to be six stock photographs and a much too realistic pig sound that makes your 1-year-old cry. The best apps should be aesthetically pleasing, easy to use, occupy your kid (but not in a glazed-eyeball way), and not so addicting that you start playing them yourself—every free moment, late at night, when you should be getting some sleep.

I’m not sure I have much to add except a “You are correct, sir!” My wife and I deploy the iPhone from time to time (okay, frequently), and Sasha seems to love the one app we give her: Koi Pond. It’s pretty simple: koi swimming in a lily pond, with trickly water sounds in the background. You can plink the water to scare the fish, or shake the phone to feed them.

Sasha will stare in amazement at the fish (and I’m not sure she actually knows they are fish, or what fish are anyway) and run her fingers tentatively over the screen. She’ll squeal and look up at me. And then she’ll pick up the phone and turn it over and stare at the shiny black back of the device. Boy does she love that silvery Apple logo! Thank you, Steve Jobs.

From aGeekSpot.com, a demo of what has Sasha so enthralled: