We have two different game sites in the Coolmath Network:

Coolmath-Games.com
(math and thinking games)

SpikesGameZone.com
(recess for your brain)

Coolmath-Games.com is the most popular educational website in the U.S. and, during school time, it's also one of the most popular gaming sites!

Since then, Coolmath-Games.com has grown to be the most popular educational website in the United States (and, not to be left out, Coolmath.com is the second most popular.)  (Stats can be verified at Quantcast.com - Spring 2011.)  In May (2011), our Cool Math Games were played by almost 21 million users!

A question that I sometimes get from grown-ups is, "Hey, I don't see numbers in some of these games.  Are they really math?"  Well, first of all, we've added more than math onto the site.  Coolmath-Games.com now has Reading and Spelling games, Geography games and Science games - woo hoo!  We also have some cool jigsaw puzzles and mazes.  But, I know what they are asking about - our cool "thinking" games like B-Cubed, Snorzees and Rotate and Roll.  At first glance, these might not seem like "educational" games...  But, just try to play them.  I dare you!  They'll seem simple at first...  But, then, something happens...  You have to plan ahead.  You have to figured things out.  You have to strategize.  You have to use logic.  You have to use your brain!  And THAT is what math is really all about.

Besides, the games are FUN and way COOL.  Kids of all ages will, then, associate "Math" with "fun" and "cool" and then?  There aren't as many complaints about doing that math homework.  How do I know this?  I get LOTS of "thank-you" emails from happier parents and teachers...  and kids too.  It's all pretty cool.

But, the most important thing is:  Are these sites safe for your kids?

The first concern is for the games, themselves.  All our games are non-violent, family friendly and safe for even the youngest of kids.  Game are not automatically submitted to our sites (as is the practice with most gaming sites.)  I check every game myself - all the way through - before I put it on one of our sites.

The second thing I want you to know is that none of our games contain links to other game sites.  Typically, websites can get free games to put on their sites, but these games contain big ads and links over to another website... and, almost always, these other sites contain games and advertising that are not acceptable for kids.  If we want to get a game that someone else has created, we contact the author and negotiate a special licensing fee where we can get these links all taken out.  This way, we can ensure that your kids don't wander from our safe sites to somewhere that isn't safe.

The third thing is that I personally pre-screen every single ad that runs on our Coolmath sites.  Although we work with the best and safest ad networks, there are still ads that they offer us that I don't feel are appropriate for a sensitive audience.  These networks do offer filters that can take out specific categories of ads and most other websites trust these to do their screening work for them, but I know they still let things through that I wouldn't want on my sites.  Yes, we make less money this way, but I don't have to worry about what your kids are seeing while they spend time with Coolmath.

I hope this makes you feel more comfortable about having your kids on our websites!  I encourage you to play along with your kids and check out our games for yourself....  You might not be able to stop!  (Our jigsaw puzzles are big favorites with Moms.)

For more information, you can check out our Safe Surfing guide.

Some suggestions for classroom use:

Our Lemonade Stand and Coffee Shop games are great business simulation games and many teachers utilize these in their lesson plans.  The kids have to buy inventory and make guesses at how much inventory they will sell and at what cost for the next day's weather conditions.

Our B-Cubed and Bloxorz games are great for classes to play together.  There's some real brain work and figuring involved on these.  The coolest thing about
B-Cubed is that there's more than one solution.  You can break the kids into groups and see how many different solutions you can come up with.

Also note that we've disabled the "high score" functions on all our games so that you can have real classroom competitions.  Also, this way your kids won't get bummed out because they can't beat the high score of some tech guy who lives in his Mom's basement.  They can compete against their OWN best score!

And, teachers, please do check out our (relatively) new Reading/Spelling games and Geography games.  Heck, even I can't stop playing our Geography games! 

You can hop on over to our "About Us" page to find out who we are!

Have fun!!
Coolmath Karen