Review and Giveaway: JumpStart-Escape From Adventure Island game for Wii

Why to buy: 
Entertaining learning tools cover a wide range of subjects; exciting, attention-getting, complex, cool graphics; incentives to keep learning; more age-focused than JumpStart World online, fairly priced, more motion-based interactivity with the program than with the computer; takes less time to load games than the computer

Why to blow off: 
Single-player mode only; cool graphics and entertainment “fluff” can distract from educational objectives

Where to Buy: You can purchase this game in many online stored including the Knowledge Adventure Store for $19.99

Full Review:  My kiddos and I were very excited about the opportunity to review Jump Start Escape From Adventure Island by Learning Adventure! We began the game by creating a completely personalized avatar called a "Jumpee".  There are lots of ways to dress up your Jumpee, but you will need to earn points by playing learning games and earn "sand dollars" in order to purchase and unlock all of the choices. Once you are in there is a whole island to explore, fun characters to listen to, and barnacle bay to swim through.  

If you've ever tried  Jump Start World online, this Wii game is very similar in that it is a seemingly endless virtual world full of kid games.  A couple things we prefer about the Wii game are first that it is more age focused (there are no toddler games for big kids to play and earn points on) and second that the Wii controller allows for more motion-based interaction. 

By playing the games, kids can practice over 150 reading, math and critical thinking skills.  A few of our favorites games are "Jet Pack", "Runway" and "Rubble Trouble".  In "Jet Pack", your Jumpee flies through space in a race to make sure that sentences are capitalized correctly.  In "Runway", kids practice following directions and listening skills by choosing the best clothing to match the occasion.  (For example: Finding all the parts to a yellow firefighter uniform.)  In "Rubble Trouble", kids learn math and counting by 5's, 10's, etc...

Being a four-kid household, we wished that this was not just a single-player game, but alas, another opportunity to learn to share and take turns.
  
Summary: If you are looking for a fun and entertaining Wii game that your 5-9 year old will love with a lots of learning games in the mix at a decent price, you'll love Jump Start World!

Win It!  Jumpstart has offered to give away a copy of Escape From Adventure Island for Nintendo Wii to one lucky reader!

Mandatory Entry: Visit JumpStart and let me what you would like your children to learn from this game.

Extra Entries: 

1.  Become a follower of this blog through google connect. This counts if you are already a follower too!
2. "Like" Be Blessed on Facebook and leave your username.
3. "Like" Jumpstart on Facebook and leave a comment.
4. Follow ReviewMama on Twitter and leave your username..
5. Post about this giveaway on Twitter, Facebook, or your blog and let me know that you did. (Enter daily if you'd like..) 
6. Tweet:  Enter to win a kids Iearning game for Wii by JumpStart: http://tinyurl.com/4e75fsb @ReviewMama #win #giveaway
7. "Like" this post on facebook:

This giveaway will end March 31st, 2011 at 11:59 pm (EST). The giveaway is open to US residents only. The winner will be chosen using random.org and I will be notifying you by email. The winner will have 48 hours to respond or a new winner will be chosen.

Please leave a separate comment for each entry, as well as your email if it is not on your profile.  Happy Entering! :)

Disclosure: We received JumpStart Escape From Adventure Island Game for NintendoWii by Knowledge Adventure to review.  The opinions I have expressed are my honest opinions and have not been influenced by the companies providing the free product.  No other compensation was received.

JumpStart World Review and Giveaway!

Pros:

Great learning tools cover a wide range of subjects; exciting, attention-getting, complex, cool graphics; several learning levels; incentives; fairly priced

Cons:

Cool graphics and entertainment “fluff” take time to load and can even distract from educational objectives; no parental controls; no progress assessment tools for parents/teachers.

Summary: If you are not looking for a full curriculum but an excellent and wide-ranging unstructured and entertaining supplementary learning tool at a decent price, you'll love Jump Start World!  You can join JumpStart for free limited access to learning games...or become a member and get access to TONS more learning games and rewards... 

Full Review: My kiddos and I were very excited about the opportunity to review Jump Start World by Learning Adventure!  Although we use books, workbooks and lots of hands-on learning materials in our home, computers seem to be one of our favorite and most effective learning tools. 

If you've never seen Jump Start World online, it's a seemingly endless virtual world full of fun learning games for kids.  Story Land is geared towards preschoolers ages 3-5. Adventure Land and Marine Land are geared for ages 5-8, and Future Land is for ages 8-10. My kids have been exploring all of the "lands" not necessarily in their age group, and have barely scratched the surface!  There is sooo much more to explore.

You start out by creating a completely personalized avatar called a "Jumpee" and naming it.  My “spicy” little girl that just turned five was delighted that she could make her "Jumpee" have purple pig tails and put a flower in her hair!  She named her Jumpee "Julia Sparklewing".  "Kyle Firewing" is a Jumpee that was created by my fun six-year-old boy and is sporting a "fast-looking" flight suit.  

Enter JumpStart world and your child will be welcomed by cute animal friends with instructions and ideas on where to play.  The landscape in this world is colorful and creative and is decorated to match the current holidays and seasons.  Playing learning games earns virtual coins that can buy pets, new clothes for your Jumpee, as well as other things to decorate and personalize their "world".  “Kyle” loves earning coins to buy pets and pet accessories.  “Julia” loves earning coins to buy furniture and decorations for her virtual room.

These learning games cover a huge spectrum of different subjects... Math, Reading, Language, Spelling, Art, Music, as well as how to be a good friend, good sportsmanship, and caring for pets. “Kyle” is doing great with the spelling and math games in the“IQ actionizer” in Future Land. 

There are also parent content pages, parent forums and the Jump Start Blog.  The Blog has articles about new aspects of Jump Start World as well as hands-on family learning activities, recipes and projects to do together.

The site is so vast that I am not sure of anything that is missing, except the following:

• I found myself wishing for comprehensive parental/teacher controls to be able to direct a child to a specific learning activity, or to put a timer on their play time.  (My kids love playing soooo much that we often have to set the timer to keep them from playing all day or to give their sibling a turn.) 

• Wouldn't it be wonderful to see a “Land” in Jump Start that teaches foreign languages? 

• It would  also be nice to be able to access a progress assessment for my children. 

Overall, a very attractive package for a good price, but you need to keep your kids on task if you want them to get something out of it besides entertainment!

GIVEAWAY!  

Now for the fun part... Jumpstart is giving away a THREE MONTH family membership to Jump Start World!

**To win, just enter one or all of the following ways below and leave a comment for each entry.**  A winner will be randomly chosen on March 31^st and notified by e-mail. 

1. Click here and visit the “About Jumpstart” page.

2. Become a follower of Be Blessed, Fan Be Blessed on Facebook, or Follow on Twitter.  (1 entry each)

3. Post a button on your blog and post the link in the comments (3 entries)

4. Visit the Jumpstart Blog and tell me what you think...

5. Post this giveaway to facebook, twitter and/or your blog (3 entries each)

Bonus:  Leave comments about what you would like to see your child learn in Jump Start World. (Enter as many times as you like! :)

Happy Entering!

Disclosure: I was provided with a JumpStart membership at no cost by Knowledge Adventure in order to test the products’ abilities and give my own personal opinions on it. The opinions I have given are mine and may differ from others but were not influenced by the company or the free product provided.