Elementary Success Deluxe 2006 (DW DVD)

by TOPICS Entertainment

Product Features

• Self-paced instruction on CD-ROM for elementary-school students
• Provides students with a uniquely diverse, fundamental course of study
• Award-winning, educator-endorsed content covering 23 subjects
• Unrivaled breadth and scope of curriculum; advanced suite of software tools
• Absorbing activities captivate user interest and maintain motivation

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B0009Y6EWU
• Item model number: 90617
• Date first available at Amazon.com: June 17, 2005
• Average Customer Review: 2.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #20,106 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

Introducing Elementary School Success Deluxe, the leading-edge suite of software tools for the personal computer. Providing all elementary students with a uniquely diverse, fundamental course of study, Elementary School Success Deluxe is the zenith of self-paced instruction on CD-ROM. Offering award-winning, educator-endorsed content, unrivaled breadth and scope of curriculum, and absorbing activities to captivate user interest and maintain motivation, the Elementary School Success Deluxe learning system represents the very definition of educational achievement for younger students.

Product Description

Math Success Deluxe 2006 helps you improve your child's math skills with great learning tools and lessons. It covers all the essential math subjects that every young students needs to master. Basic math like Multiplication and Division, Fractions and Decimals are introduced, and more advanced topics like Trigonometry are made easy. It's the ideal learning suite for young students at all learning levels.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Lots of boring talking- couldn't stand it, January 5, 2006

By 

Love to read (United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Elementary Success Deluxe 2006 (DW DVD) (CD-ROM)

I bought this, hoping it would have some fun math and reading games for my child, but it was so boring. It had this horrible voice repeating the instructions over and over again before you could play. Even a child with angelic patience wouldn't want to sit through that every time. It now sits in our house, never used...more clutter.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Ripoff, July 25, 2006

By 

deir (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Elementary Success Deluxe 2006 (DW DVD) (CD-ROM)

What a HUGE disappointment. I was looking for an alternative to the Summer Bridge books for my 8 year old son to finish out the summer and thought that, since computer time is prized at our house, he'd be motivated by CD-ROMs. After only an hour and a half with these CDs, we're both perplexed and annoyed.

1) Installation: Each CD must be installed separately - language arts, phonics, math, etc - so they don't talk to each other about your child's performance. But it turns out, that would require waaay more thought than has been put into this software.

2) This one's the clincher: The box says ages 6-12, grades 1-6. However, when you sign in, you're not asked your child's age or permitted to create any kind of profile apart from entering his/her name. This seems odd because, you know, how do you get to the lesson content that is age-appropriate. Short answer? You don't!

TOPICS has tried to create single lessons that work for 6-12 year olds! That's right. For each course, there is just one little set of lessons. Earth Science, for example, contains two stories - one about earthworms, the other about moths. That's it for 1st graders and 6th graders - one set of lessons, one set of puzzles and games to reinforce ideas. Instead of being just right for my 3rd grader, oddly we found that the lessons were either too hard or too easy.

3) Typos: Besides being age-inappropriate, the lessons and games all contain significant typos that threw my son off. With the little content that is provided, you'd think they could've read for context rather than just run spellcheck. Examples: "Washington" was spelled "Washinton." In one 2-paragraph page about earthworms, we were told that earthworms don't have but do need eyes underground (a do/don't typo), that they are burned by UV rays the same "hat" (should be "that") cause sunburn, and yeah, there was another typo I've forgotten. But, yes, 3 typos that misled my son on one page of text. Awful...By then, he was saying, this is JUNK.

4) Interface: There is a bizarre game which is the only way to work on History/Social Studies course material. The game itself made no sense to either of us. Help was no help. A Prewriting exercise gives you some instructions, and then just stops. No explanation. No feedback. What about this could I not have done on my own?

5) And yes, that voice is pretty unbearable. It's a bad recording of a woman with a stuffy nose and a harsh tone to her voice.

At $40, it is a CRIME that you can't return software. If this is the best of what's out there, I suggest signing up for some supplemental courses with an online education provider or signing up for something similar at Kaplan SCORE or Huntington Learning. These CDs will only frustrate and discourage your kids.

By contrast, do check out Chessmaster, 10th edition. It does allow creation of profiles with age and experience level, and has boards for kids which give feedback in an encouraging way. TOPICS could learn a lot from this software which we purchased the same day.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Bad organization of materials and bad DVD quality, November 26, 2005

By 

P. Zeng "Zeng" (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Elementary Success Deluxe 2006 (DW DVD) (CD-ROM)

It is (supposed) for kids of 6-12 but my 8 year old (2nd grade) was very fruntrated to find the right questions/materials for her. There are no clear indications on 13 DVDs. Also, the DVD quality is very bad. Two of the DVDs could not be read at all from my new dell PC (maybe my cd-rom drive is not good enough but I never had problem to read other DVDs). BTW, I bought mine from Cotsco wholesale store.