Aaron Hamann
Multimedia Software
November 1, 1999
Product Name: Hot Dog Stand: The Works
Producer: Sunburst Communications, Inc.
Copyright: 1996
Compatibility: CD-ROM for Macintosh or Windows
Price: $79.00
Contact Info:Sunburst Communications, Inc.
101 Castleton Street
Pleasantville, NY 10570
1-800-321-7511

Product Overview: Hot Dog Stand is an interactive piece of software that simulates the actual day-to-day operation of a small hot dog stand located in a stadium. The student is required to complete all related business that is associated with the stand including checking weather, ordering supplies, advertising, setting prices, and becoming familiar with the trends of sales in the hot dog stand business. The student must work toward a profit goal that is set at the beginning of the operation and all decisions that are made by the stand operator will effect profits in some way. The focus of this program is on many mathematical skills and also certain language art skills such as writing,translating information, and choosing appropriate tools to work with.

Instructional Design

Ratings (0-5) based on the Hoffman and Lyons’(1997) evaluation instrument
5 Instructional Goal: Students employ various mathematical skills that are outlined according
to NCTM standards(1,2,3,4,7,8,10,11) Way of assessing this goal is meeting of
projected profit.
5 Content: Includes various classroom activities that support material within software. Topics
are presented in a way that students can construct their own knowledge.
3 Audience Definition, Range, and Appropriateness: A specific audience is not defined and
classroom settings are not specified(i.e. business class, math class, etc.) It does provide
ethnically unbiased characters and a range of difficulty.
2 User Configurability:Students are allowed to save in the middle of a scenario, but
everything else is predetermined by either the program or the instructor
4 Degree of Support: The program provides various help options such as pop-up buttons,
balloons, and interactive graphics that help to guide the user. This program also provides
various levels for more advanced users.

Interface

4 Type of Design: Software allows for free movement throughout the program and allows the
user to decide what things get done when. However, it does do a good job of keeping the
student on task. There are a few distractions that detract from the design such as the joke
book, recipe book and puzzle.
5 Interactivity: Student centered activity encourages a high level of interactivity
4 Ease of navigation: Navigation becomes very easy after working with the program for just
a short time. All links and areas of exploration are clearly marked or highlighted.
5 Visual Clarity and Usefulness: Very realistic and relevant graphics that encourage students
to explore and learn
3 Sound Clarity and Usefulness: Some sounds are helpful, but most are plain such as the
“click” sound heard after every mouse click on a link The interaction of characters by sound
adds to the program.

Summary:This program is laid out in a very meaningful manner and can be useful in a variety of situations. I was disappointed in the lack of target age and intended type of classroom this software was to be used in. I feel as though it can be utilized in classrooms such as business classes or math classes, consumer science classes, or any other area that may want to incorporate the objectives that are set forth in the teachers guide that accompanies the software. The program emphasis is more on the students’ gaining of knowledge on an individual basis instead of being presented in a slanted viewpoint. There are a few distractions in the program, but I feel that in the right setting, this program can allow students to study a real world type of problem in a simulation setting.