Kiss Your Brain: Avoid Summer Brain Drain- Part 2

-From the Desk of Heather Tuttle, Curriculum Writer- This year, as the final school bell rings and your kids leave their math books behind, be sure they don’t forget to bring the learning with them. Prevent the infamous summer ‘Brain Drain’ by creating daily learning opportunities at home. From learning on the go to planned [...]

Re-gen! Regeneration!

Balancing Character, Story and Game Play: Part 1

– From the Desk of Glenn Seidel, Game Designer– Have you ever been to the circus and watched a performer on tight wire spin plates and keep their balance? Finding the right balance between characters, story and game play is pretty similar. It can be tricky not to let one element over whelm the other [...]

Homework: Your Child Can Practice Life Skills as well as their Lessons

-From the Desk of Heather Tuttle, Curriculum Writer- Life Skill #4: Communicating with Authority Figures We talked about how homework can improve your kids’ communication skills with their peers. But it is also a great tool to teach kids how to communicate with authority figures. First of all, sometimes there is just too much to [...]

Kiss Your Brain: Avoid the Summer Brain Drain

-From the Desk of Heather Tuttle, Curriculum Writer- As the month of May comes to a close, your little ones have probably already begun their countdown to the much anticipated summer vacation. As much as your studious pupils deserve some fun and relaxation, it’s important that their brains don’t take a break all summer long. [...]

Cute 4 year old doing JumpStart “gumball” math!

Can you guess what he’s spelling at the end?

Homework: Your Child Can Practice Life Skills as well as their Lessons 3

-From the Desk of Heather Tuttle, Curriculum Writer- Life Skill #3: Communicating with Peers Life-Skills #1 and #2 (keeping a to-do list and time management) are pretty obvious life-skills your kids can learn from homework. But how about one that’s a little more out-there: Homework can be a great opportunity to teach your kids some [...]

Affecting The World You Play In

– From the Desk of Glenn Seidel, Game Designer– How would you like to change the world around you? Don’t like that billboard? Change it! Wish all the flowers in the garden were yellow roses? Change it! Want all the statues in the world to be monkeys? Hey, you could change that, too! Affecting the [...]

Bag the Bag: A Fun Green Craft for Your Kids!

You see it every day…Go Green, Recycle, Save the Earth! Well, here’s a great way to have fun with your kids while going Green: Make your own reusable grocery bags. It’s a cute, creative way to keep the plastic bags out of your landfills and your kitchen. (Come on, admit it! We all have mountains [...]

Moving from a 2D World to a 3D World!

Hi Gang, I was digging through our JumpStart vault, fighting dust bunnies at every turn, when I found some great concept art from a long time ago.  Well, about five years, to be exact, which means ancient history in video game years and 33 in dog years.  Back then, real-time 3D games were primitive so [...]