Math Rider Review

When I received Math Rider to review for The Old Schoolhouse Magazine's Homeschool Crew, I wasn't really sure if my daughter would like it.  She's not particularly interested in horses, so I wondered if

that might cause her not to enjoy using the program.  I had nothing to worry about, though!  She really enjoys it! 

Math has never been her best subject, and I'm always looking for ways to make it easier or more fun for her to do.  There's not much way to make learning math facts easier except by making it more fun, and Math Rider does that!



The screen shot above shows one of the backgrounds that your student will see as she races to correctly answer her math facts.  There are other backgrounds that are used as well.  (You can see one of the other backgrounds below.)  The student sees a math problem (We started with addition facts since she's not quite ready to go on to multiplication facts yet).  and has to type in the correct answer before the horse jumps over the hurtle. 

Mary Grace (age 8) really likes the challenge of trying to answer each math problem before her horse jumps over the hurtle.  I like it too because it doesn't give her time to count up the answers if she doesn't already know them.  I remember learning to quickly count up the answers to the math facts instead of really learning them.  I don't want Mary Grace to learn to be a quick counter--I want her to actually learn the facts so she will always remember them.  With Math Rider, that is a necessity.

The screen shot above shows the student's progress.  The red line shows the student how far she has progressed, and its length increases each time she completes a new "lesson."  Mary Grace loves looking at this "progress report."  It makes her feel like she is accomplishing something.

The only thing I didn't care much for is that, at the beginning of the program, there is a story that tells where/why the horse needs to ride quickly and jump over all the hurtles.  The child's mother is deathly ill and the child is racing to get some medicine for her.  I would like to see the story be something less negative and maybe more inspiring or something like that.  I thought maybe the story would bother Mary Grace since she's a real "Mommy's girl," but she just ignored that part and went on with the math problems. 

One other thing that some folks may not like is that there are some references to magic or things being magical.  I don't prefer to stress magic, and my children know that things don't happen because of "magic" but instead because of God.  I would prefer that the magic parts not be in there at all, but it's pretty easy to skip over them. 

In short, I have to say that Mary Grace is really enjoying practicing her math facts using Math Rider.  This is certainly a program that I would recommend! 

You can visit the Math Rider website here.  Math Rider can be purchased for $37.  It comes with a 30-day money back guarantee too, so you can try it out out without worrying about wasting money if your child doesn't like it for some reason. 

If you'd like to see what some of the other Crew members have to say about Math Rider, click here.