JumpStart Review
My six year old son has enjoyed playing MathBlaster.com for several months and we were recently introduced to the companion online game, JumpStart®.com 3D Virtual World. Since he has enjoyed playing several other JumpStart® educational computer games in the past, he was excited to play this online game. Of course, I first wanted to make sure that it would be safe for him to play online and learned that I can set parental controls and the game has pre-programmed names to ensure that kids are completely safe and cannot share any personal information giving me peace of mind to let my children begin their learning adventure.
JumpStart.com has been a big hit with my children. So much in fact that I let them earn “credits” by completing chores and doing well with their school work which they can trade in towards minutes to play their new favorite game. I appreciate that JumpStart.com makes learning fun and is something that they are willing to work hard towards playing.
After launching the colorful and engaging virtual world, my son and his siblings began to explore JumpStart and can design a character, decorate a house, adopt cuddly pets and play games with friends. My son’s favorite part has been adopting a “dragon” and then feeding it, decorating it and playing with it. When they successfully complete a learning game or challenge, they are thrilled to earn “coins” and points that they can use to personalize their JumpStart® world even more.
JumpStart.com allows children to explore and play for FREE but I highly recommend the membership plan which includes up to six kids and offers additional bonus features such as:
- Explore and Play with Friends
- Access 1000’s of Member Only Learning Games
- Practice Hundreds of Additional Skills for School
- Download 4 PC Games ($80 Value!)
- Hatch, Raise and Train Mythical Creatures
- Bonus FREE Membership to MathBlaster.com
A membership to JumpStart.com is available in three convenient options including only $7.99 per month, an annual subscription for $74.99 or a lifetime membership for $149.99. You can learn more about JumpStart.com and set up your free account or purchase a membership today by visiting the JumpStart.com website.
*I did not receive any financial compensation for this review, though I did review a sample of the product for evaluation purposes. The opinions are based only on my experiences with the product.*
I loved the Beaver character.
I want the JumpStart Deep Sea Escape – DS game
[email protected]
jump start was introduced in 2009!
[email protected]
My 6 year old son would love this!
leanne_gag[at]hotmail[dot]com
i learned jumpStart inspires minds and JumpStarts self-confidence… the fun way.
I love that there are worksheets for everything! My son is only 3 and I see plenty of things that we could do together!
I like the game because it is educational. Best of all, my daughter enjoys playing it online. She has been bugging me about getting a paid membership, so I had to enter this giveaway. As a parent, I really appreciate the parental controls.
I love the worksheets they have!
I learned that a membership here also gets you a second membership with Mathblaster.com.
i really liked the graphics! they are great!
taylormarves at gmail dot com
I like how you can play without being a member, but your membership really does give obvious benefits.
acvanslyke!gmail.com
Showed it to my kids and they love it!
I like that kids are completely safe and cannot share any personal information
its pretty cool, i like the games available!
Jump start creates great educational games.
I had never heard of them before. I see they are grouped into age groups which is great and helps them with their math of course. Great site. Thanks for the review. Rita
They even have mobile apps.
I learned that w a membership you have access to 1000 games, only educational.
I like the new arcade games in the OctoLair.
A word of caution, after experiencing this website (free version) and seeing what you could get with a paid membership, I was sold. I finally tried to purchase membership yesterday (lifetime) and found it automatically gave me a monthly one. They will automatically charge me every month now. From their terms agreement, they do not do refunds and I’m in the process of trying to reach them because I still want the lifetime membership even if they mistakenly are charging for a one month membership too. Also, when I tried to upgrade my membership online to the appropriate one I wanted, the price changed. Perhaps they charge differently in Australia compared to the US ($59.97 compared to almost $150)
I sent an email yesterday and so far no reply which is fine but their phone service is atrocious. I spent almost 30 minutes just trying to get through to someone. The answering directory gives you options to direct your call but the numbers you press don’t get you anywhere. After listening to their directory message 3 times and pressing the number I wanted, it takes me elsewhere to another directory. If you’re lucky to have it direct your call again, it says that the message box is full and then it says it is directing you to the operator. It doesn’t actually do this, it just keeps saying that’s what it’s doing, like a broken record. I’m feeling highly sceptical of them now. I realise that Jumpstart will give out free memberships to those with blogs and kids product review sites and this is probably your best bet if you want to avoid the pitfalls that come with trying to get a paid membership. If you’re not going that route, buyer beware.
One last note, yes there are parental controls which is great but- I realised they do try to get the kids to get out of them. I was watching my kids play when they came across one virtual ‘child’ among the thrall of them who called out to them by screenname. My kids, wanting to be polite tried to reply to them. There are some standard phrases to choose from but this wasn’t enough to adequately reply. They were feeling substantially “rude” and wanted to add them as a friend. The end result was, we realised this was not a real child as it didn’t speak like a real child, it just looked like the others. I almost was going to let them change the chat settings as a result but I’m glad I didn’t. So my verdict is, while I think this is a great way to practise math and other subjects, parents, keep an eye on what your kids are doing.
The “Virtual child” that you are referring to are actually ficticious “workers” at JS. Each area has a handful of them. The way you can tell them apart is the fact that they use the Jumpees name almost everytime you encounter one of them. If you use one of the canned replies to them, they will use another canned reply back.
My kids have been playing Jumpstart for the last 2 years, and I am totally pleased with the site. Very safe, and I trust it with my kids.
As a follow up to the comment above, I did send another email to Jumpstart and they did reply this time. They said that they were refunding the monthly membership fee of $4 and so, as a result I went ahead and tried again to purchase the lifetime membership which seems to have gone through as intended this time. I will admit the kids, upon membership finishing were dissapointed but now that we have a permanent one, they are thrilled. Customer support may have some issues but the site is very popular with the kids.
There Billing system is not right as by default they charge you continuous billing and and it is not very clear when you sign up as they suppose to provide their customer to choose rather be choose by default. My Son wanted to try and he doesn’t like much but got charged for next month automatically. I know this continuous billing is by intention as they know not lot people read fine prints.
Not happy with billing.
WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE EVER!!! THE CUSTOMER SERVICE DOES NOT CARE ABOUT IT’S CUSTOMERS. I PAID FOR UNLIMITED, CANCELLED AND WILL GO FIND ANOTHER GAME FOR MY DAUGHTER. these people are RUDE!
Continuous billing and no refunds is despicable. I have to “jump” through hoops to STOP giving them money??? This is shyster behaviour.
JUMPSTART.COM IS A FRAUDULENT COMPANY.
DO NOT do business with them.
I have been unable to cancel my membership with JUMPSTART.com for over 1 year now. The charges just keep coming through even though I have officially canceled as per their exact instructions many times now. They simply send an automated reply that they received my email but then I never hear from them…and the charges continue.
There is no phone support. This is a RIPOFF!
I believe A CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT IS IN ORDER as I am assuming we are not the only people being falsely charged on an ongoing basis.
Coming for a company that bills itself as an a premiere educational company for children, THIS IS DISGUSTING!
Thank you all for your time in writing comments. My children grew up with Jumpstart and Math Blaster and I was looking into the programs for the upcoming generation. I was disappointed to find that neither of these programs are available any more. How joyous I was to find that we can actually buy a subscription and that my grandchildren can still play many of the old games that I remember my children playing so well. I downloaded the sites and registered. I then logged in and started playing…. or at least tried to. It seems that all anyone can do without purchasing anything is hatch an egg. You have to hatch the egg, name the egg, color the egg, tickle the egg, dance with the egg….yes it goes on and on. My first red flag was the fact that the “hatching of the egg” process uses only the arrow keys on the keyboard. There were a few places where a mouse button was accepted but any movements of the aviator had to be done with arrow keys. Who uses arrow keys to move anymore? My grandchildren are growing up with automatic touch screens and barely know what a mouse is let alone with toggle keys. With that said I understand that to actually be able to “play” any games, one should first pay for them; although I would have thought some trial game or game parts should have been available. I am not looking to pay for the privilege of my grandchildren keeping virtual pets. With the keyboard/mouse issues and the lack of “trial samples” I began to get skeptical and do some digging. After reading past all the one and two line reviews all done on the same day or so, I began to turn up real reviews; not positive ones either. So for those of you who have spent your time writing a review and who may actually check back here years after you wrote it, I thank you. Your honest reviews have probably saved me some headaches. I truly hope that Jumpstart does get its act together as I think that they had a real winner. However a lot of updates need to be done before they are ready for the new generation.