Children collect treasures to personalize their own treehouse. There is a bonus CD in the package, Kid Works Deluxe, which is a kid-friendly word processor. Madeline Classroom Companion 1st and 2nd Grade is a 2-CD set with each CD devoted to a grade level. Madeline hosts the activities in various locations in Paris. A focal part of a typical first grade curriculum is learning to read and write.
Children learn to apply their basic phonics skills to decode words.
This, of course, is a very important skill, yet most multi-subject first grade programs don't do an admirable job of strengthening or building reading skills. With the exception of My Personal Tutor, these titles do not have much depth in terms of actually helping a child to read. Most only scratch the surface. When reading the box of JumpStart 1st Grade, I was impressed that it included 50 stories, but was disappointed because although questions are asked to test comprehension of the stories that are read aloud, there just isn't much in the form of reading instruction. The books are minimally interactive, and full sentences instead of single words are highlighted as they are read.