Customer Reviews

Mind Power Math Middle School (Grade 6-9)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I purchased this program for my seventh grader with great expectations. I've always been very impressed with all The Learning Company's products. Unfortunately, this program wouldn't work on any of the four computers I tried to install it on. After going back and forth with The Learning Company's tech support people, for over a week, they finally told me that the problems I was having trying to get this program to run was a problem they'd seen many times with people who had DSL and there is no fix. Right now I'm in the process of trying to return this program.

I'm a homeschooling mum and I bought this for my 9 year old son who loves math. It's an absolute dream! I had no problems whatsoever installing the program and my son was captivated from the start. The package is presented by a green alien by the name of Digit who is totally engaging and explains carefully everything your kid needs to know. The only problem I have with it is limiting my son to one lesson per day.

The 4 cds are a whole course, designed to be worked through systematically. I would imagine it would get pretty confusing if you just dipped in at random as the lessons build on one another and rely on concepts and terminology introduced in earlier lessons. It is assumed that the player (student?) can add, subtract, multiply and divide competently. If you get stuck, you can click 'Show Me' and you are guided through a step by step breakdown of the current problem. If you make a mistake, a relevant explanation is usually given. After every lesson there are practice problems to work through, usually with a good 'real life' theme.

The only drawback I've found is that the program is so good at teaching your kid mathematical terminology that they end up asking you awkward questions like 'Mum, do you know what the multiplicative inverse of 22 over 7 is?' at inopportune moments...

My son is in fifth grade and loves it, he is working on the first disk (4 disk set) and is very excited with the program. I don't remember being excited about learning math when I was his age.
I had a problem when the program was first installed, the splash screen came up and when you clicked on the start button, the window opened up in Internet Explorer and was just a blank screen with a blue background (never loaded the Flash menu). I went to Macromedia's web site and reinstalled Flash Viewer and the program loaded correctly. I am running a PII 450 with Windows XP, I have not had any other concerns with the software and would recommend the program.

I brought this software for my six-grader. I always like the learning company's product but this one does not impress me at all. The graphic is primitive and the presentation is boring. There is no extra practice or test you can do. My son ran through all the CD's but he really does not enjoy it. I just brought Math Advantage 2004. I have problem running the problem on a computer with 1GB of memory. But I install it on another machine and it works. I like the presentation much better and my son seems to like it too. It has an examination area where you can test your understanding and a game area to make it more fun.

When my mother got me this I was very excited. This game really helped me alot. That is a very big compliment because I'm terrible at math. You will not be dissapointed.

P.S. It worked with my Toshiba Laptop and my mom's custom made computer(not a specific brand)

I bought this software because I love The Learning Company's (TLC)software. You won't believe the difficulties that I've gone through in installing this software in my new Computer (Windows ME). I have fixed the problem by going to the Macromedia website and downloaded "Macromedia Flash Player". Afterwards this software (Mind Power Math Middle School) run perfectly. My son enjoyed its delightful graphics and excellent mathematics presentation. It's worth all its troubles, it is just EXCELLENT!!

This legacy style software has not been updated for use on more modern safer computers using more secure Browser setups, we had to dig out an old Windows 98/ME version computer with no browser security settings and that we won't connect to the Internet to get it to work right and without forcing my family to try and manage a bunch of workarounds to use it! While that is OK for now in our case I can't recommend this software to anyone unless you are willing to do the same and have such an old computer sitting around.

While indeed the math teaching and math practice content does appear vast, useful, fun, and great once you do get this legacy software running, yet the fact it wants to make use of old dangerous local browser page file calls in a way that every browser completely blocks these days as a big security "No-No" and that viruses, Malware, and hackers love to abuse these days is a clear sign this software (not the content) is WAYYYY out of date today. It's too bad as it is a great math tool otherwise. (By the way it does not seem to support any scoring record keeping and is just for one student with no profiles for different users - but hey what do we expect for the price?). Sadly though the vendor does not appear to offer even a simple support page online for their product (hello?) much less someone to call for a patch or solution (don't worry it's not your computer or DSL/Internet with the problem, this program was not designed for use with IE7, 8, 9 etc or newer versions of Netscape or Firefox, the unsafe local browser to file call functions are all blocked by default today for safety's sake, programmers have to use another method now). The content however is definitely useful if or once you get it running like we did. Either use an OLD compatible computer type on their list that has no security and that never connects to the Internet to enjoy this math training, or pass on it. This is true unless you take the risk and danger of manually disabling all browser security protections (and I don't mean just pop-ups). Also TheLearningCompany does not support it now.

This product is very well written and demonstrated, but it requires a good deal of work - the kind of work required for competency in math. I teach and tutor math at a local Davenport University and from years of experience I can assure you that most people's difficulty in math stems from a lack of rigorous "wrangling" with basic math concepts. In other words, most students don't want to "work through" thoroughly the examples in any given chapter. Instead, they just want someone to show them how to do the homework problems for class credit. And by thoroughly, I mean a step-by-step prodcedure for understanding the logic (not just the "math" numbers) from one step to the next. Yes, this takes time and effort, and that's what MindPower will do for you, but not if you're just looking for quick answers and fixes.

That some people have had difficulty with the programs actually working is another problem and has nothing to do with the excellence of the math material presented. That being said, I highly recommend this product!

IT'S TRUE. EVEN "I" CAN LEARN MATH FROM THIS METHOD. I wished this was available back in the 1970's when I was in school... I STRUGGLED SO MUCH BACK THEN, UNTIL NOW. As an adult, these disks made sense to me. Good approach for kids. BUY IT, YOU WILL N O T REGRET IT.

I don't have other people's problem. I have DSL and I installed it on Windows Me. It works fine.

The software is running slow. I guess people who wrote this software were paid much less than people who program games. The software could be designed better. It's running in 600x480 screen. I have a 21" moniton. But you can only use a samll part of screen. The program itself has several windows but all these windows are within the main frame. It's kind of disappointing.

Anyway it's educational software and it's better than my previous educational software. It's sold at the price of a book. You can't expect too much.