JumpStart Advanced 1st Grade [OLD VERSION]

A kid could get lost in all of this audio, visual, and educational stimulation. There is simply a lot going on here: a quiz to match learning styles with the appropriate buddy; another quiz to set difficulty levels; a collapsible toolbar that changes game levels, reveals progress reports, stores power-ups, and accesses learning buddies; eleven games with activities ranging from pizza-making (fractions!) to news reporting (writing!); plus power-ups to collect, tracks to build and scooters to customize, all leading up to the big payoff--a scooter race to end all scooter races.

Fortunately, designers did a good job with the flow of this program, and it is easy to forgo the quizzes and just get on with playing games, collecting rewards, and building the best scooter in the universe. JumpStart Advanced 1st Grade assumes fluency in counting, spelling, and reading. Also, this is not a good first program for a kid who has never used computer software before. Concepts like fractions, decimals, sentence building, punctuation, and science are explored here. There's a place to create printable artwork and compose save-able tunes, but the strongest emphasis is on the three Rs. (Ages 5 to 7) --Anne Erickson

To me, Jumpstart Advanced Grade One *is* advanced. It's got Grade Two cirriculm coming on strong. But so what? The child playing it doesn't know the difference between grade one and two 'ideals' so they play, and the game naturally advances as they do. And that's what's great about these Jumpstart Advanced, they do, in fact, *advance*!

Without partental supervision or help, this is a CD for a child who can now read (or at least take a shot at sounding out) 'See spot run' and has a basic grasp of phonics. Having watched my 5 1/2 year old child play it over the last month, I have not noticed *any* phonics in it. But she plays the Reader Rabbit Phonics CDs and the Jumpstart Phonics CD, in addition with this one. If your child has no phonics skills, get a phonics CD ("Reader Rabbit I can Read! with Phonics" is good)I can sit beside them while they play and help them out while i do the laundry. It's astounding how fast they learn if you teach them to sound things out.

This particular CD, the Jumpstart Advanced 1st Grade is a very full, rounded CD. It's teaching them fractions (they build pizzas and have a list: one half pepperoni, one quarter green peppers, etc), reading, addition, subtraction, grouping, analyzing, etc.

It's entertaining. It assumes. But far better that then them have played it out in 3 weeks or become bored of it because it's too easy.

Worth the money. I plan on getting *all* the jumpstart Advanced products. I have the Jumpstart phonics one, and the Jumpstart Advanced preschool which was a huge hit.

Jumpstart Advanced (no other previous Jumpstart products *but* the Advanced) has thoughtfully included an assement test your child can take over and over again and which will automatically reset the levels of learning they are at by the score results - you can also take the test then adjust them manually if you like. There's also a report card of sorts that allows you to see which parts of the game they are playing and how many right answers they score. I never mention what they are scoring to them, but it is interesting to see what they do and what they like and what needs work.

Great product. Well worth the pennies.


Great Game!!!   October 26, 2008
T. Jackson
I LOVE Jumpstart!!! I've had a lot of their games since I was little. I have the classic Jumpstart 1st grade but I also love the Jumpstart Advanced series. In Jumpstart Advanced 1st grade there is an annual scooter race where the prize is a space type scooter. But there's a problem. Squirt who is either Frankie's little brother or friend got pushed off his scooter by a mean weasel named Jimmy Bumples and his sidekick Skid who is a rat. Also Jimmy never lost a race. So can Frankie, Kisha, CJ, Pierre, Hopsalot, Casey, and Eleanor win the race and win the scooter for Squirt? Buy this game and find out!