Awesome Animated Monster Maker Math

Reviewer: Terri Buganski
I am a computer resource teacher for the Newington Public Schools. I work at the middle school level - grades 5-8. Martin Kellogg Middle School
Email: bugsy812@aol.com

Awesome Animated Monster Maker Math, 1998
Houghton Mifflin Interactive
http://www.sunburst.com/
CD- ROM
System requirements - Windows 486/100 MHz or higher. 8 MB RAM (12 MB recommended for Windows 95) Double speed CD-ROM, MPC2-compatible sound card. SVGA Display - 8 MB Free hard disk space.
Macintosh - System 7.1 or higher. 8 MB RAM (12 MB recommended for Power PC) Double speed CD ROM Drive - Color Display - 8 MB Free hard disk space.
Evaluated on a Macintosh PC 5500.
Date reviewed - December 1998
List price - $44.95
Rating: 8 on a scale of 1 to 10, Cool.

Description: Awesome Animated Monster Maker Math features thousands of problems in six levels of play which cover areas in math for grades 1-6. The student is challenged by a broad range of critical math topics including problem solving, logical reasoning, estimation and solution strategies. The basic premise is that the Nasty Blobblers have stolen a precious monsterpiece from the Rogues Gallery and it is up to the user to build a monster hero and solve the case. The program changes each time so that no two games will be exactly the same.

Likes :

Parental/Teacher Control Feature - allows the teacher to customize the content in order to provide practice of particular skills. The automatic leveling feature keeps track of a childs progress in each activity and responds by offering the opportunity to move up or down a level in that activity. This means that a child may go up several levels in an activity which matches his/her strengths without affecting the level at which he/she is playing in other parts of the program. Although, I did not see the guide it was stated that the program comes with an 80 page supplement which includes activities that can be played away from the computer.

Six levels of play.

Motivational

If the user falls below a certain level in any activity, their hero will be blobbed and they will return to Hero building. The new hero will pick up where the previous hero left off.

Don't like - I didnt like that I had no manual and no on screen help. I was able to use the helper bug to check my score, print out a picture of my monster, change my level and see my clues and I had the reading bug to hear my problem read aloud. However, if I didn' t thoroughly understand the problem or needed help with a step there appeared to be no help which could lead to frustration. Mine included, at times!!!

Age - The publisher recommends ages 7-10. However, I had a few sixth graders trying it and they were motivated and involved. I would recommended elementary.

Explanation of different Activities:

Hero Building Activity - the student is asked to build a Hero Monster which will fit the criteria defined in the math sentence. Click and drag parts from the volcanoes to the body to build the hero. To change the type of body part click on the volcano containing the part and cycle through till you see the one you like. When youve built the monster that fits the criteria, click on the Done Bug. To pay for your hero, youll need to click on the Money bugs to move money from You Have to You Owe columns. To break a money bug into its component parts click on it to move it to the next column. This reinforces the concept of place value.

Navigation Activity - a way to learn direction and movement using [x,y] coordinates. At the lower grades, the directions are up, down, north, south, east and west. At higher grades [x,y] are introduced. Click and drag the stars at the top of the map to the appropriate grid coordinates to answer the problems.

Number Drop activity - practices a wide variety of skills. I tried Rounding to 100. The problem required me to round the expression in the blue smoke cloud to the nearest 100. Then I had to catch the answer by moving the monster back and forth using arrow keys. With each correct answer, a crumbler part was freed. When all the parts were free Slipppo asked me to reassemble the Crumbler. When all is together the done bug is clicked.

Recipe Activity - practices measurement and estimation skills by following a series of instructions and determining the appropriate tools for each task. The tools are the ruler, the scale, and the FireFroster.

Logic Activity - a series of puzzles whereby parts are dragged to the two or three bodies to meet the conditions of the puzzles.

Rescue sequence - When the user has obtained the four secret items , the secret location of the Blobber KingQueens lair is revealed.

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