First, have your child enter the virtual world at JumpStart.com and run over to his or her room. Make sure the room looks just the way he or she wants it, and have the Jumpee stand so that you have a good view of the room.

If you’re using a PC, you can press the “Print Screen” button to capture an image of the entire desktop and send it to your clipboard. To do the same on a Mac, press Command-Control-Shift-3. If you press Command-Control-3 on a Mac, the same image will be automatically saved on your desktop as a PNG file.

Open an image editing program like Microsoft Paint. Paste the image into the program.

In Paint, choose Edit > Paste.

Once you have the image pasted into the program, choose “Save As” to save the image to your computer.

Choose File > Save As... to save the file.

Make sure to save the file in a location where you’ll be able to find it easily. Facebook supports a fairly wide variety of file formats, but JPEG (.jpg) is a safe bet.

Now you’re ready to upload the photo to JumpStart’s Facebook fan page! First, navigate to the fan page. At the top of the screen just underneath the text entry box, there is an icon with a photo on it. Click on this icon.

Click on the photo icon to get started.

Next, Facebook will give you the opportunity to choose whether you want to upload a photo from your drive or take a photo with a webcam. Choose the first option.

Choose "Upload a photo from your drive."

Find the image file on your computer and upload it. Once you’ve uploaded your photo, simply click “Share” to show it to the JumpStart Team and other JumpStart fans!

As we deliberate, we’d like to get your input about which room is your favorite. Click over to the “Photos” tab to see the screenshots that other JumpStart fans have posted. To show your support for a screenshot, just click the “Like” button underneath it. Your guidance will come in handy as we work to pick out the most magnificent room in JumpStart! Once we have a winner, we’ll announce our pick on Facebook and right here on the JumpStart Blog.

Tell your friends you want to see their rooms!

During the Jumpee Contest earlier this year, visitors to JumpStart.com had the chance to design a Jumpee and post it on the site to compete for votes. Over the course of the contest, we saw all sorts of amazing and creative Jumpeez. But one Jumpee managed to capture the lead with more than 18,000 votes!

Now, we are thrilled to reveal the grand prize winning Jumpee…

The prize-winning Jumpee!

and introduce his designer – Caleb from Maryland!

Frankie and Caleb

This July, Frankie hand-delivered the $10,000 grand prize to Caleb, a 7-year-old first grader who loves science, math, building with his Legos, playing chess, and doing science experiments.

He rang Caleb’s doorbell and…

Frankie meeting Caleb

…met our winner! While he was there, Frankie got to know a little bit more about Caleb. Caleb is a Cub Scout whose favorite summer activity is swimming. He also collects snow globes, and his favorite place to visit is the B&O Railroad Museum. When Caleb grows up he wants to be a scientist, and we know he can do it! Congratulations, Caleb!

Stay tuned to the JumpStart blog and JumpStart.com to be the first to know about future contests! Or, for more details about the 2009 Jumpee contest, click here.

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“Where are you going?” asks Jack SlothSprout.

“I am going to explore JumpStart,” Bugsy FlameCloud replies. “Follow me!”

JumpStart.com is taking children’s gaming to new heights with the addition of canned chat! Jumpeez can now communicate with one another using pre-selected words and phrases. We know kids love to chat online with their peers, and sometimes dance moves alone won’t cut it. We’re dedicated to keeping your little ones safe and happy, and we’re confident that the new canned chat function will do just that!

Canned chat is now available at JumpStart.com!

Here at JumpStart, we want to make sure your kids are both having fun and, of course, learning. The great thing about canned chat is that while your kids are socializing with their Jumpee friends, they’ll also be learning sight words that are important to their reading skills.

Edward William Dolch is famous for his creation of a list of important words that occur frequently in children’s (and indeed, all!) books. The Dolch words are now known as “sight words” because most of the time, they cannot easily be recognized by pictures or sounded out according to normal phonetic rules. There are 220 sight words and another 95 nouns that should be standard knowledge by third grade. A full list of the Dolch words and additional nouns is available here.

The words that appear in our brand-new canned chat function are based on Dolch’s research. As children use “sight words” repeatedly to communicate with other players in the virtual world, they will become more familiar with them and recognize them more readily. By including many “sight words” in the canned chat menus, we hope to advance the reading levels of our players and build their confidence in school!

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Dance party at JumpStart.com!

We’d love to hear what you think about what’s happening in our virtual world at JumpStart.com! Please use the comments section of this article to give us your feedback. We’re also happy to answer any questions you may have. Thanks for your input!

For more information about our multiplayer features, check out our earlier articles here and here.

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With our new multiplayer feature, the world at JumpStart.com is more exciting than ever. It still has all the same fun learning adventures as before, but your child can now learn and play alongside other kids. Yes, that means that all those other cute Jumpeez running around are actual players, learning at their computers just like your child!  Plus, we’re developing group activities and challenges that will teach participation, sharing, and teamwork.

To celebrate the release of our multiplayer features, we’ve added a dance floor in the center of the JumpStart world so that players can boogie down together! We always let the newest feature take center stage, so access to AdventureLand has been moved to the submarine near the ocean.

Jumpeez boogie on the JumpStart.com dance floor!

Safety is always a top priority at JumpStart, so we’ve built this new multiplayer feature in a way that allows for playful communication without the ability to share any personal information. Participating in the JumpStart world will reinforce safe, positive habits for your child as he or she begins to use the Internet. To learn more about the new multiplayer feature of JumpStart.com and its benefits, check out our earlier article here.

See it for yourself at JumpStart.com today!

Please note: If you and your child are more comfortable with the single-player learning environment, you may opt out of multiplayer. (But be warned, you are sure to be missing out on an exciting dance party!)  To opt out, visit “Online Game Preferences” under “Manage Account” and click “disable.”

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Facebook, Twitter and blogs may sound like havens for college kids, but today, more and more parents are turning to the web to rekindle old friendships, share stories and catch up on the latest gossip. Sounds good, right? But how would social networking fit into your life?

Let’s start with the basics. Here are some quick and simple definitions of the most popular social networking types and services:

• Blog: A web log. Basically a virtual journal or diary
• Twitter: A micro-blogging service that lets users send short and sweet life updates (tweets) of 140 characters or less.
• Facebook and MySpace: Social networking sites that allow users to create profiles, share photos, schedule events and more.

Now that we are all on the same page, let’s get to the why? To find out why parents love connecting with others online, we checked in with some of our favorite mom bloggers. These ladies have a way with words, so who better to explain the top reasons for using these new online gizmos? Here are the top reasons they shared:

1. Connect:

In the words of Tracey from Just Another Mommy Blog, she blogs, “for the same reason that mothers used to throw Tupperware parties….to connect with other people who are willing to listen to me rant and rave about the miniscule details that parenting 3 children involves.” Tiffanie of Three Peas in a Pod offers similar sentiments saying, “Parenting is tough, but staying connected to other parents helps our job go a little easier. Many times you learn that you are not the only parent out there that is dealing with that.” For MaryTara of the Bon Bon Gazette, blogging offers a platform to share her own learnings about autism and special diets. She explains, “What started out as a project mostly for my own personal use started to really reach others and I began receiving more and more feedback from “strangers” about how my experiences and advice had touched or helped them in some way.”

2. Tips and Tricks:

As Angela of Nine More Months explains, “Moms are a wealth of information. And weird as it may sound, when I have a parenting question, the first place I turn to get an answer is the Internet. I trust what other moms and dads have to say, and with so many people having access to the Internet, I’m bound to find someone who has ‘been there done that.” Cecelia from Cool Baby Kid adds, “With the ability to collaborate with other parents around the world [online], we can exchange parenting tips, cool product finds and so much more.” Carissa of Good & Crazy People, harnessed the power of social networking just last week when her daughter came down with pink eye. She reports, “I got several different tips and ideas for how to combat it, from all three, my blog, facebook AND Twitter!” Some parents, like Amy from 1 Girl + 4 Boys = Paradise, have even found money-saving ideas through their social networking connections. She explains, “I have learned about a lot of special offers, coupon links, and sales that really help out our family budget.”

3. Creative Outlet:

For some parents, blogging is the perfect creative outlet. Shara of Mamalicious Finds says, “I just plain love to write. I always have. Blogging gives me that creative outlet that I crave and it keeps my mind working.” Heather, author of The Gift Closet, agrees, explaining that she started her blog, “as a place I could let my creative side flow. I like to share ideas, tips, recipes, funny or inspirational stories.”

But it is Tracey of Just Another Mommy Blog who offers perhaps the most compelling reason to connect with other parents online, “I can do it in my jammies or at 2 am once the monster in the closet has been banished!”

If you’d like to see what our panel of social networking moms are up to online, we encourage you to check out their blogs!:

• Just Another Mommy Blog (Tracey)
• Three Peas in a Pod (Tiffanie)
• Bon Bon Gazette (MaryTara)
• Nine More Months (Angela)
• Cool Baby Kid (Cecelia)
• Good & Crazy People and Mom it Forward (Carissa)
• 1 Girl + 4 Boys = Paradise (Amy)
• Mamalicious Finds (Shara)
• The Gift Closet (Heather)

My 4 year old daughter loves to play computer games (educational). She sometimes spends more than 2 hours playing every day after school. What is the appropriate time spent on the computer as far as the eyes are concerned? We have a laptop but should we buy a special screen to protect her eyes? Thanks a lot – Ilana

Answer:

If you are concerned about eye strain, experts recommend the following:

• Since computer workspaces are often arranged for adults, make sure your workspace fits your child’s smaller body.
• Recommended distance between the monitor and the eye for children is 18 – 28 inches.
• Use proper lighting around your computer.
• Try to minimize glare.
• The screen should be tilted slightly downward at a 15-degree angle.
• Limit computer and game use to 20 minutes at a time.
• Make sure your daughter gets annual eye exams.

I am not an ophthalmologist or optometrist, so if you have a concern about your daughter’s eyes, discuss the situation with a professional.

Hope this helps!

Top Dangers for Kids Online

Cyberbullying
Take the playground bully, add digital technology, and suddenly, kids can be humiliated in front of thousands of Internet users, not just the rest of the playground. Cyberbullying occurs in a wide variety of forums – from email to chat rooms to websites – but by definition always has a child on both sides of the encounter. Parents need to be aware of cyberbullying not only to keep their kids safe, but also to make sure they don’t engage in it. Unfortunately, thanks to the wonders of digital media, it is all too easy for even a passing comment or joke about another child to go viral and escalate into a case of cyberbullying.

Predators
Unless you’ve actually met him in person, it’s impossible to be sure that the “soccer-loving 9-year-old boy” in the chat room actually is a boy, much less that he’s really 9. The anonymity of the Internet makes it all too easy for a person to take on a fake persona. Predators are lurking in chat rooms and social sites, waiting for kids to reveal a little snippet of personal information so they can form a connection and eventually gain the kid’s trust.

Inappropriate Content
The Internet has information about pretty much every topic imaginable – and lots of it. Unfortunately for parents, this includes a large amount of content that is not appropriate for kids. Even worse, this content can crop up on seemingly appropriate pages in the form of banner ads and pop-ups.

Top Tips for Internet Safety

Between school, friends, and necessity, it’s impossible to shut the Internet out of our kids’ lives forever. But don’t panic, we are not doomed to hand our kids over to the bullies and predators of the Internet. Instead, we must teach kids to be smart, vigilant, and in control while online. Here’s how:

• Keep the computer in a central family area instead of in a child’s room. This will allow you to keep an eye on your child’s activity and intervene quickly if he or she strays into dangerous territory.
• Activate built-in parental controls or consider purchasing a separate control to weed out inappropriate sites. Many browsers, service providers, and operating systems are equipped with free controls for parents. These controls allow you to block or allow websites, view reports of your child’s online activities, and set limits for computer use. For a more robust system you can consider purchasing a program like Safe Eyes 5.0 or Cyber Patrol 7. Or you can download a free parental control toolbar from organizations such as WRACC, a non-profit committed to empowering parents with greater control of online content.
• Establish ground rules for Internet use including daily time limits and acceptable types of sites. What types of sites are your children allowed to frequent? Can they be online to play games? Get extra practice or research a school subject? Chat with friends? Make sure your kids know what you expect them to be doing while on the computer.
• Make sure your child is aware of the importance of keeping all personal information private – this means not telling anyone his or her name, address, phone number, or school ever.
• Open a dialogue about your kid’s online activities and be interested! Make sure you know who and what your child is interacting with online.
• Create a safe zone for talking about online activities. Never use loss of Internet privileges as a punishment for something your child tells you happened online. This will only encourage your kids to hide any uncomfortable encounters.
• Research the websites your child is visiting or joining. Visit these sites yourself to check content, what capabilities they have (chat, gaming, profiles) and what other sites they link to.

For more tips on online safety, visit these sites:

• Common Sense Media
• PTA
• FBI
• ConnectSafetly

With these simple tips, your child will be safe while enjoying the massive world that lives within your computer.

Let’s begin with the basics – what is a virtual world?

Put simply, a virtual world is a place where people create a character (avatar) and interact with other people or their surroundings. Often based in magical or fantasy realms, virtual worlds do not necessarily follow the rules we humans are stuck with in the real world – gravity, aging, time, distance, or human appearance. Imagine a fairytale where you become a character and choose your own adventures – now put that on the computer, and you’ve got a virtual world.

So there’s our reality – the bills, the in-laws, the diapers – and then there are these totally separate worlds online? Well, not quite. While the line between “real” and virtual may have once been clear-cut, that boundary is not so obvious these days. With many virtual worlds offering the opportunity to meet and mingle with your real-life friends in a simulated environment, relationships are affected by virtual game play. Perhaps even more peculiar, you can now use cold hard cash to buy virtual items– an exotic pet for your avatar, a never-before-seen virtual sofa for your room, an exclusive pair of virtual boots to make you fly – things you will never physically see, touch, or wear.

With the wild success of virtual worlds for both kids and adults in recent years, it seems virtual worlds are here to stay. Businesses and schools have already begun to embrace this new technology, recognizing its ability to bring people across the world together for lectures, meetings, and even hands-on training. Dozens of colleges and universities have even begun building virtual campuses inside some of the most popular virtual worlds for adults. It’s not a stretch to think that by the time our children are in college, students will be able to interact with their classmates, professors and even subject matter entirely in virtual spaces. Imagine being able to learn about digestion by navigating through a virtual body – it sure would beat those dull biology textbooks!

Risks & Benefits

As virtual worlds become commonplace, it is important to weigh the benefits and dangers before logging in. Virtual worlds are susceptible to the general dangers of the internet – intrusions on privacy and predators. Plus, with the huge amount of interaction between kids in many virtual worlds, issues like cyberbullying can become a much larger problem. That being said, most kid-focused virtual worlds have protections in place to cut down on cyberbullying by limiting communication, especially communication of personal details. As with television, radio or any other medium, virtual worlds can be a great experience, but parents and kids alike must be aware and wary of the potential dangers.

Despite these dangers, virtual worlds arguably offer a number of important benefits – especially for kids. Your child will learn responsibility by caring for a virtual pet, acquire social skills by meeting new friends, and build confidence by shaping his or her own identity. Even better, a few kid-friendly virtual worlds involve currency systems based on playing educational games or fulfilling missions to earn moola. Kids are so focused on earning enough to buy the latest pet, fashion or decoration that they don’t even notice they are learning! All this, not to mention the fact that these kids will be better prepared for a tech-savvy classroom or workplace.

Getting Started

Does it sound like a virtual world might be a good match for your family? If so, here’s where to start:

1. Do your homework. Ask around the schoolyard and check out published reviews from other parents. Pay special attention to safety features the program offers – pre-programmed or limited chat, moderators, parental log-in and controls– and determine if the site is offered by a brand you can trust.
2. Once you’ve located the ideal virtual world for your child, set some ground rules. Make sure to have a balance between “screen” play (computer and TV) and “real world” play.
3. Talk to your child about online safety and the importance of keeping personal information private. Establish an action plan should your child ever feel uncomfortable online: turn off the monitor immediately and tell a trusted adult what happened.
4. Finally, as your child embarks on a new adventure in the virtual world, it is important to keep the lines of communication open. Talk with your child about his or her experiences in the virtual space, ask about the decisions and friends he or she is making – you just might find out something that surprises you!

So how exactly does the art team create a 3D building?

I caught up with Christopher Williams, Knowledge Adventure’s Senior Art Director to find out. According to Chris, once he and Knowledge Adventure’s producers have identified a project, his team selects a style or theme for the characters, buildings or landscape they’ll be creating. Then the concept sketching begins.

A few notebooks and colored pencils later, here’s what they’ve got:

Pretty impressive, right? But, since they are not producing flat illustrations for a book, the artists now need to turn these sketches into 3D objects. Using a 3D modeling tool, the artists stretch, twist, bend and mold polygons to match their sketches – basically creating tiny building blocks and adding them together to form any object imaginable, from a puppy to a Ferris Wheel.

Using this modeling tool, a sketch morphs into a 3D building!

Now since that gloomy gray color certainly can’t appear in a game, the artists carefully select colors and textures to match the building. From bricks to tile to stucco to shiny plastic, the artists can make their building look as though it was built from just about any material imaginable!

Next it’s off to be animated and added into the game itself – but that’s a story for another issue.

Keep an eye out for all new buildings coming to life at JumpStart.com this holiday season!