Software Reviews--JumpStart Animal Adventures from Knowledge Adventure

Cyber News and Reviews is a monthly column published since 1995 for parents, teachers and small business and home business owners offering articles on some of the best computer products available. I cover business software, education, entertainment with freeware and shareware, and some hardware too. Over the years, I've reviewed computer programs from Microsoft, Knowledge Adventure (Davidson) and others. When my kids were young, they couldn't wait for the software to arrive and have fun testing the games and lessons with me. And, in the past few years they've contributed some of their own reviews with opinions. The best advice on software is from the children who use it. Also, many of the business programs reviewed are useful for home business and small business owners. HB

JumpStart Animal Adventures from Knowledge Adventure

If you and your kids want to learn a lot of something about the world of animals, then JumpStart Animal Adventures is a new educational title you should consider. Kids ages 4 and up will learn by seeing and hearing the animals in their various habitats around the world. Knowledge Adventure, known for its excellence in educational software, does it again with their latest software CD for kids, making learning fun. The software features 4 animal habits and over 40 animals for kids to explore.

After a quick installation from a single CD, you'll watch an entertaining animal wrap music video with great graphics and sound effects. Then you're offered a challenge: enter a contest to win. Most kids will definitely take the challenge. They do like contests and want to win (at least my two daughters--Sarah and Becky--are always ready to take up challenges that could mean winning free prizes).

Kids will begin by filling out the contest entry form and selecting one of the three levels of play. Frankie, the well known Knowledge Adventure dog will assist you. Your immediate goal is to win the contest by identifying and photographing animals in their habits and copying the photos to the correct spots on your contest sheet. Kids will earn points for completing their projects and animal stickers may be printed as an award.

All activities start from the main menu, which is the AOR Vehicle (also known as the "All Over Rover"). After you select a destination from the world map, you're transported above Earth's atmosphere and then down to the habitat area you've selected. You'll then exit the rover and explore. Don't forget to take the camera from the AOR, you'll need it to capture photos of the required animals for your contest sheet.

Besides traveling the world in search of animals you can run music videos that mimic some of the popular rock videos seen on the cable channels (like MTV or VH-1), with printable lyrics if you want to sing along. You can also view a progress report accessible from the AOR plus print out craft pages and habitat sheets.

This is a great educational software package with lots of activities guaranteed to keep any 4-year-old child, girl or boy, busy for hours.

JumpStart Animal Adventures sells for $19.99 and will run on any multimedia PC, Pentium 233 MHz or faster, 64 MB RAM with Windows 95/98/ME/2000 and a 12x CD-ROM drive. It also supports the Power Macintosh, 233 MHz or faster, System 8.6 or higher with 64 MB RAM and a 16x CD-ROM driver. For more information, or to order, visit Amazon.com.

Howard Berenbon

Software Companies Mentioned

Knowledge Adventure, Inc.
19840 Pioneer Avenue
Torrance, CA 90503
Phone: 1-800-545-7677
URL: http://www.education.com

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