Archive for February, 2009

Inspired by the Academy Awards, DreamBox Learning set out to find the best math articles of 2009, so far. Despite popular belief, we aren't just about math games. We also appreciate journalists and bloggers who make math problems and science news interesting and accessible. Without further ado, DreamBox Learning presents the best math articles of 2009… cue applause.

Every day now driving home and listening to the news, I try, like everyone else I imagine, to wrap my head around the kinds of numbers they’re throwing around. The scale of the numbers is incomprehensible. How meaningful is the difference between a billion and a trillion...

I recently came across two articles that really caught my eye.The first was in the Wall Street Journal and was a ranking of the best jobs in the US. Mathematician was ranked #1, with Actuary and Statistician holding #2 and #3 respectively.

While I put out bird seed in my backyard feeder like many of you, I also have helped keep hummingbirds alive through five Seattle winters, traveled to Antarctica and the Canadian tundra to take photographs of birds, and help care for shorebirds and seabirds at a local aquarium. The Christmas Bird Count is one of the big yearly bird events in North America. Counting birds in their winter territories establishes expected norms which helps private and public conservation groups develop appropriate species conservation plans.

I am a DreamBox teacher as well as the parent of a pre-schooler. I must confess there are times I have a hard time not helping him play DreamBox. He really enjoys playing and he is learning a lot. But there are times when the games are challenging for him.

Parents, you can surprise your kids by setting the DreamBox Learning characters as your computer screen's background image (or you can display the DreamBox logo). Just click on the display size you want below, save it to your computer, and set it as your "wallpaper".

The DreamBox Adventure park is a magical place where kids can choose which adventures they would like to explore. You have the choice of four themes...

Mathletes, human calculators, and DreamBoxers get ready!

If you have children, chances are good that they brought home a box of valentines this week…

Who says Valentine’s Day is only about Hallmark and sugar? Classrooms can find creative ways to expand this holiday into a great learning opportunity.

The DreamBox Adventure park is a magical place where kids can choose which adventures they would like to explore. Four themes are available to DreamBox players: Pirates, Pixies, Dinosaurs, and Pet Friends! These themes, as well as some of the stories and adventures that kids explore, were inspired by and suggested by kids we’ve talked to [...]

Recently, a friend of a friend who had reviewed our offering wrote to me and said, "Overall I find the business model of a monthly charge very strange for a children's learning software. Usually one buys a book or a CD/DVD for a one time price and can use it indefinitely. DreamBox's offering basically means that now parents need to pay over and over again if their kids want to revisit lessons or if they are just slow learners. A more appropriate pricing model would be to sell the service per lesson or grade level. That would appeal a lot more to me. Think about it. I have to spend $100 for one year of service and after that I basically lose access to the learning tools unless I continue paying. For $100 each year I get many learning software on CD/DVDs or books and I can keep them forever. That is a very easy decision in my mind."

Here at DreamBox, we recommend for best results that a student play at least twice a week for 15 minutes at a time. Some will play more. However, like Vitamin A, a lot more is not better. To take an extreme, a child playing 3 hours a day every day is crowding out too many other activities for a happy child.

The DreamBox Adventure park is a magical place where kids can choose which adventures they would like to explore. Four themes are available to DreamBox players; Pirates, Pixies, Dinosaurs and, Pet Friends! These themes as well as the stories and adventures that kids explore were inspired by and suggested by kids we've talked to and some of our school beta testers! The DreamBox creative team thanks them all for inspiring us and helping us make a great product!

Here's a way to surprise your DreamBox-loving kids: download their favorite theme characters and display them as your desktop image! Just click on the size you need, save it to your computer, and set it as your screen's wallpaper or background image.