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Websites with a Cause

What it is: I have posted before about a website called Free Rice.  This vocabulary game has the added benefit of donating rice to help end world hunger.  For each correct answer, Free Rice donates 20 grains of rice on your behalf.  This isn’t the only website with a cause.  Aid to Children is a vocabulary game like Free Rice, for every correct answer $.25 are donated to children in need through World Vision.  Free Poverty is a world geography game.  See how many cups of water you can donate by testing your knowledge about the world.  Each correct answer means that 10 cups of clean water have been donated on your behalf.  Free Corn is another vocabulary game like Free Rice, for every 25 visits to the website, 1 kernel of corn is donated.  Free Kibble is a trivia game.  Every day your students play Bow Wow Trivia 20 pieces of kibble are donated to Animal shelters to help feed their hungry dogs.  Free Kibble Kat also donates 20 pieces of kibble per player each day…this time students are raising kibble for cats.   How to integrate Websites with a cause into the classroom: Each of the above websites offers a wonderful opportunity to teach students to look outside their own needs to the needs of others.  Use these websites to teach your students compassion, about other cultures, and about helping those less fortunate.  The websites will also be a great way for your students to practice vocabulary or geography.  Encourage your students to play these games from home when they are “bored” or just for fun.  See how much rice, money, corn, water, or kibble you can raise as a class.  Use these figures to teach graphing and charting.  You can also use the sites to teach persuasive writing.  Students can create a “commercial” for the site, a poster advertising the site, etc.  (I found a commercial that I made as an example for my students on Free Corn…small world!)  Using these websites with my class taught me just how compassionate and concerned my students are.  It was wonderful to see my students come together around a common goal. Using these websites with a cause in your classroom is a real life character education lesson! Tips: Bookmark these sites on classroom computers, kids who finish their work early can sit and play one of the games while they wait for the next activity. Leave a comment and share how you are using Websites with a cause in your classroom.

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Create Your Own Storybook with Learn Direct

Posted by admin | Posted in Fun & Games, Interactive Whiteboard, Interactive book, Language Arts, Primary Elementary, Secondary Elementary, Teacher Resources, Websites | Posted on 04-11-2009

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What it is: Kids can be the star in these online storybooks with Learn Direct. Students can type in their name and be a character in the book.  On each page their are options for customizing the story.  Students can adjust pictures and certain sentences in throughout the story.   After students have customized the book it can be read online, saved as a pdf or printed out.  These fun interactive stories will make reading time fun for your beginning readers (kindergarten through 2nd grade).  Learn Direct also features a fun little virtual world where students can play word and reading games.  Students have to solve word puzzles to navigate through the world.

How to integrate Create Your Own Storybook with Learn Direct into the classroom: These online stories are a lot of fun.  The ability to customize them will make them a winner in the classroom.  Use the Storybook with an interactive whiteboard and have students take turns customizing the story.  Set up the Storybook on classroom computers as a center activity during literacy or reading time.  Students can save or print out the books to share with others or take home.  The word games in the virtual world would be fun to play and solve as a whole class with the interactive whiteboard or play in pairs on classroom computers as a center.

Tips: There are some great tips and resources for parents about reading with their kids on the Learn Direct site.  Check out the Scared of Words? page and then pass it on to your parents.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Create Your Own Storybook with Learn Direct  in your classroom.

Comments (3)

November 6, 2009 Links | Footnotes of a Retired "Teckie Teacher" said on 05-11-2009

[...] iLearn Technology » Blog Archive » Create Your Own Storybook with Learn Direct [...]
Allison R. said on 06-11-2009

I immediately checked out this website. What a great tool to use in teaching adjectives and elaboration to young writers. My students would love to create their own personnel story book to read. The words in the stories are a little advanced for my first graders right now, however they would enjoy reading it at home with their families. The website is very user friendly and visually appealing to kids. Thank you for sharing!

Allison
Carrie Stare said on 08-11-2009

This software caught my eye because I recently had a colleague mention it in a class discussion. He had discussed how much of an improvement this technology made with his Spanish classes. After looking into the Learn Direct website, I think that it would have a great effect on creative writing in my language arts classes. I would also be interested to see how I could integrate it into other classes.

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