Literature
Skoolbo
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Skoolbo is a free downloadable program for both Macs and PCs. There are also apps available for IOS and Android devices. Skoolbo is essentially a literacy and numeracy program designed for 4 – 10 year olds to practice their core literacy and numeracy skills. This is done through a 3D world where the progress through this world is determined by students successfully answering questions. The questions focus on the following areas:-
Literacy
- Phonics
- Fluency
- Vocabulary
- Comprehension
- Grammar
- Spelling
Numeracy
- Number Development
- Addition
- Subtraction
- Number Patterns
- Time
- Multiplication
- Division
Each student is required to sit pre-tests on Reading and Numeracy to work out the difficulty level for the student, this is continually assessed and the difficulty adjusted when needed. Students receive ‘Bo’ coins for answering questions successfully which can be used to purchase rewards such as racing worlds, toys and other items.
Below is a video of Skoolbo in action.
The Amazing Word Tamer
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The Amazing Word Tamer is a great tool to develop further your student’s writing talents. Word Tamer is centred around a ‘Funfair’ where you can explore and play around with ideas and hopefully get inspirations that can be included in your stories.
The activities you can expect are….
‘Wild Words’ has you catching random words that come out of the clouds. It then invites you to use these words as inspiration for your writing.
‘Capture a Character’ is where you start developing ideas for your characters attributes. Using the robotic hook, you need to capture the characteristics you want.
‘Prowl Through Plot’ explores what happens to your stories plot when you make changes. Once you complete this activity it gives you a great story starter to base a story on.
‘Snare a Setting’ has you shooting at clown faces to choose your setting. Once you have chosen four words to describe your setting you are then taken to a screen where you can type up your ideas for the setting based on your four words.
‘Grapple with Genre’, looks at what the possibilities are for the writer if you combine different genres. For example a Science Fiction Adventure. Then you are asked to start writing down ideas based on your selections.
Overall ‘The Amazing Word Tamer’ is an inspirational tool for students to develop their writing in detail.
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Storyline Online
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Storyline Online features videos from members of the Screen Actors Guild Foundation reading aloud children’s books. Each book has activities and lesson ideas associated with it. Some of the more recognisable names reading books are…
- Betty White
- Jason Alexander
- Elijah Wood
- Lou Diamond Phillips
- Al Gore
The books that are available are listed below.
Toontastic
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Toontastic is a fantastic cartoon creation tool on your iPad. This is a very accessible tool that can be used by children as young as five and be enjoyed just as much by big kids such as myself. Toontastic’s interface is separated into 5 easy steps to create your own cartoon.
Step 1: Story Arc
In the Story Arc you develop your story structure. This is a great aspect of toontastic and really introduces the concept of how a good narrative story should be structured. You start with the ‘setup’ where you introduce your characters and the story setting. Then the ‘conflict’ where you create a problem for your main character. The next aspect is the ‘challenge’, where you can if you choose to make the problem even more difficult. Then comes the ‘Climax’ and ‘Resolution’. All of these scenes are interchangeable and you can add more scenes if you wish.
Step 2: Setting
Once you have chosen a scene to edit from the ‘Story Arc’, it is time to choose a setting for that scene. There are a few standard settings to choose from or you can draw your own scenes. You can also purchase more play sets that includes scenes and characters.
Step 3: Characters
After you have chosen your setting you then need to pick your characters. Again you can choose from the characters that come with the app or draw your own. You can also purchase more by getting a play set via an in app purchase.
Step 4: Animation
This is the most exciting bit, animating your characters and giving them a voice. First you can place your characters where you would like them to start within your scene. You then press the ‘Start Animation’ button and go about moving your characters around narrating your story or speaking for your characters to tell the story. When you’ve finished click ‘Stop Animation’. Then move onto your next scene.
Step 5: Music
After animating your scene you a brought to the ‘Music’ section. Here you choose an appropriate emotion that coveys the essence of your scene. You then need to decide on the degree of that emotion to convey. This will determine the strength of music that will appear in each scene.
Once you have finished with your cartoon you can sit back and enjoy what you have created. Cartoons can be shared on ‘Toontube’ once you have created an account. An email will be sent to the parent’s account for approval of a cartoon before it can be viewed online.
I can see ‘Toontastic’ being used successfully in a classroom to assist students with developing their narrative story telling skills. This app could greatly assist reluctant writers or those students needing to build their vocabulary in describing a story.
Below is a promotional video from Launchpad toys the creators of Toontastic.
Toontastic from Thushan Amarasiriwardena on Vimeo.
iTunes link: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/toontastic/id404693282
Admongo
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Admongo is an online resource to help students become critical thinkers about advertising in all it’s different forms. The program is aimed at students aged 8 to 12. The goal of the program is to get students to ask three key questions:
# Who is responsible for the ad?
# What is the ad actually saying?
# What does the ad want me to do?
Admongo consists of an online game, sample ads that can be used in the classroom, free lesson plans and teacher training videos.
Below is an introductory video to help explain more about Admongo.
ZooWhiz
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ZooWhiz is produced by the team at EdAlive. ZooWhiz is a free online learning system that covers Maths, punctuation, spelling, grammar, vocabulary, phonics and reading in a fun and creative way. Teacher’s are able to sign up fro free and then set up accounts for their students to use at school or at home. Students start by choosing their avatar and then can go about completing the more that 17,000 learning activities, either selected by their teacher, parent or themselves. Students earn coins for completed activities that they can spend at the ‘Biodome’ to purchase animals for their Zoo or go to the arcade to play mini games. If you have used any of EdAlive’s products before then the learning activities will be familiar to you. My class has started using this, and they have been highly motivated to use ZooWhiz. ZooWhiz is in public beta at the moment, so not all features are enabled yet. It is very usable in it’s current form and requires a very small amount of time to setup. I really appreciated the fact that ZooWhiz has a print option, to print out username and password cards for your students.
To view a video tour of ZooWhiz please visit this link: http://www.zoowhiz.com/tour
To view samples of the activities please visit: http://www.zoowhiz.com/educational-content/sample-activities
Dust Echoes
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Dust Echoes is a series of twelve animated dreamtime stories from Central Arnham Land. There is also MP3s, Wallpapers and Study Guides for teachers to download. I have found this resource to be a great way to introduce dreamtime stories to students. The Study Guides are great at explaining aspects of each of the dreamtime stories and suggesting relevant activities.
Study Ladder
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Study Ladder is an Australian online Mathematics and Literacy program for R-7. It provides year level resources that instructs students on skills via videos and gives them opportunities to reinforce those skills via online activities, games and printable worksheets.
Teachers are able to setup a class group, giving each student a username and password. Teachers are then able to set specific tasks for the whole class or individual students. Students are rewarded for their efforts via certificates and use of a rewards room (pictured below).
The site also provides resources for Music, Art, Language and Culture, Science, Health Safety and Citizenship. Many of the instructional activities have been designed to be used on your IWBs. There is a Naplan section with printable resources to assist with preparing students for Naplan.
The site is free for teachers, giving students unlimited access during school hours. It gives students limited access to the activities during after school hours. If students want unlimited access at home then there are paid options for parents.
I have used this site for three years now and found it to be very supportive of my curriculum in the classroom. The video explanations in particular, can be very supportive for parents trying to assist their child with homework or explaining a concepts.
It is yet another tool to make learning literacy and mathematics fun and motivates students to succeed.
International Children’s Digital Library
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http://en.childrenslibrary.org/
iPad app: ICDL – Free Books for Children – International Children’s Digital Library
Below is a mission statement about the intentions of this organisation.
MISSION STATEMENT
The mission of the International Children’s Digital Library Foundation (ICDL Foundation) is to support the world’s children in becoming effective members of the global community – who exhibit tolerance and respect for diverse cultures, languages and ideas — by making the best in children’s literature available online free of charge. The Foundation pursues its vision by building a digital library of outstanding children’s books from around the world and supporting communities of children and adults in exploring and using this literature through innovative technology designed in close partnership with children for children.The ICDL Foundation is a non-profit corporation.
Making Tracks
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This is a great collection of books, that has a website to support them. The website gives you resources or ideas to further explore each book. It also gives you various classroom ideas or online activities that go along with each book. I used two books last year with my Year 3 class. When you have students spending their lunch time to go and borrow the books you have been reading in class, you know you are on a winner.
http://www.nma.gov.au/kidz/making_tracks/
Making Tracks takes young readers on a fictional journey through some fascinatingAustralian stories, inspired by objects from the National Museum of Australia’scollection. The series is written and illustrated by leading Australian children’s authorsand artists.” – National Museum of Australia Website
This collection of books would be a great resource for shared reading or a class novel.
Just some of the titles in their collection….
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