I am really excited about this program! It teaches computer skills and basic programming in a wonderfully simple and fun way. Book 1 provides a self-study introduction to computer skills in the form of a student manual with answer key for grades 5 and up (though being computer illiterate, it was about my level). It teaches basic skills in programming, making web pages, simple animation, word processing and spreadsheet skills. It introduces your student to the universal elements of computer languages, including variables and logic. Ben is really enjoying this program and was animating his own cartoons by the 4th lesson! Warning: Ben feels that the text book doesn’t contain quite enough explanation. Being a computer geek, he has risen to the challenge and will click on things and tweak things until he figures it out. So, if your student isn’t comfortable with experimenting on the computer, he may get frustrated; however, the book comes with troubleshooting tips, and the computer program has tech support available to help you if you get stuck. Also, Ben tried to skip some of the activities that he deemed "boring," in order to move ahead to the exciting stuff - and he got hopelessly lost. We had to go back and start over. The moral of this story is that the preliminary activities are essential to understanding the course, so don't skip them, no matter how menial they seem! Book 2 takes you further and even teaches your student how to create 5 complex games (including a star wars-style game, a pac man-type game, and a hangman game), plus teaches him HTML, how to create web sites using Nvu, how to build calculations into a spread sheet, and even teaches him some DOS. Contains 31 lessons and an answer key. Finally, all of this is only possible if you have the MicroWorlds program disk, which is the program you need to complete the above courses and teaches kids the Logo language. The MicroworldsEX software works with Windows 98 through Vista as well as Macintosh OS X 10.2.8 and better. You will also need Mircrosoft Word, EXcel, and a browser such as Internet Explorer or Netscape. Please note, each book is about a year’s worth of science. Unfortunately, the publisher will not allow us to discount this curriculum unless we sell it as a bundle, so check out the package deals below. Bundle includes Computer Science Pure & Simple books 1 & 2 plus the Micro Worlds EX disk.