Customer Reviews

Weekly Reader Learning System Mastering Elementary & Middle School Math 2009

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This has helped my son to better understand math. The lessons are both heard and written on the screen, and will not advance to the next step until you click on "next", and if you misunderstand something, or need to go back a few steps, it will let you.

I was very disappointed with this product. The packaging is pretty but don't let it fool you - this software may have been state of the art in the late 90's but nowadays there are much better tutors out there.

1. The disc comes with no booklet or written support but it DOES come with a poster-sized flier promoting Weekly Reader's other products. If you want to learn how to use it, you're on your own. There is a very short tutorial video on the disc but it, too, is aimed at telling you where to find additional products for purchase within the software's navigation.

2. The software lessons are narrated but they are instructions for you, the parent. They show a slide and tell you what to explain to your child, then move on to the next slide.

3. The "interactive tutorials" are little more than Powerpoint presentations with a voice reading the text in the slides. When I purchased the software I expected a problem, a creative, kid-friendly explanation of the problem and an engaging demonstration of how to solve it, an opportunity for the child to solve a problem, and feedback on the answer. What the software presents is a problem, a slide and a narrative on how to solve the problem, the presentation of another problem (which the child solves on paper because the software didn't allow input), then on to the next. No feedback, no interaction.

4. The previous reviewer advised that the lessons didn't proceed until the child got the problem right; that wasn't the case with my software. In the few parts that DID have a space for an answer, we could just click NEXT and it would proceed ahead. When my daughter finished an entire lesson in 30 seconds, I found out she just had to keep clicking NEXT in order to finish. She didn't even have to do the exercises.

5. Disc was apparently not configured correctly. My links for FRACTIONS and FRACTIONS AND DECIMAL REVIEW both brought me to the FRACTIONS AND DECIMAL REVIEW. It was impossible for my daughter to complete the review because she couldn't access the lesson on which it was based.

6. The software taughted the ability for parents to monitor the child's progress but the Progress Report always came up empty.

The best tutorial math software is truly interactive and allows the child to learn through repetition, guidance, and instant feedback (it does exist!). If you're looking for a truly effective program, keep looking because this program is not it.