Archive for category: On the Internet

We’ve all been missing Harry and the Gang, of course, which is why we were so excited to see the new website, Pottermore.

Getting Kids Reading has qualified to be an early, beta-tester of the new Harry Potter site.
That means we’ll be able to bring you an insider’s view of all of the magical outpourings of J. K. Rowling’s imagination, a month or so before the site is open to everyone in October.

(There are one million other beta-testers, incidentally, so we’re not exactly letting our special status go to our heads.)

They chose the beta-testers through a special contest. For one week, pottermore.com asked a question a day to elicit a clue which we then used to “find” a magical quill.

Test your little Potter fan and see how many he or she would have gotten correct!
Here are the clues they asked:

Day 1 Clue
How many breeds of owl are featured on the Eeylops Owl Emporium sign? Answer: 5

Day 2 Clue
What is the number of the chapter in which Professor McGonagall cancels the Quidditch match between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff? Answer: 14

Day 3 Clue
In the Gryffindor versus Slytherin Quidditch match, in Harry’s third year, how many points is Gryffindor leading by before Harry catches the golden snitch? Answer: 60

Day 4 Clue
How many students take part in the Triwizard Tournament during Harry’s fourth year? Answer: 4

Day 5 Clue
What is the house number of the Headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix in Grimmauld Place? Answer: 12

Day 6 Clue
How many chapters are there in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince? 
 Answer: 30

Day 7 Clue
How many deathly hallows are there? Answer: 3

The image of the magical quills came from the “Pottermore Insider’s Blog,” which magically disappeared after I clicked on it. OK, maybe I’m not so much “magical” as I am “technically incompetent” – but my point is, I’d love to know who the artist is. These are beautiful. And, clearly, magical.

OK, this is a great tip but it might be a bit… er… nerdy. But then, so am I. And so is my kid, who wears it like a badge of honour.

You’ve seen these QR codes, right? They’re on ads, posters, marketing material. Maybe you never knew what they were.

They’re like bar codes, but readable by anyone with a cellphone. You take an app like RedLaser (iPhone or Android) and scan the QR code, which reveals a hidden message, website, phone number, URL, etc.

So I was thinking it would make an excellent scavenger hunt to get kids reading.

You create some goofy, fun, positive or even utterly meaningless messages and print them out. Then you hide them around the house and give your kid your phone. Hilarity ensues. Well, maybe not hilarity – but certainly reading.

One scavenger hunt game could include messages like, “Look under the couch” and then the QR code hidden under the couch would read, “Look in your left shoe by the door,” and so on until the kid finds a new book on his pillow or something.

Or you could print one up and stick it in your kid’s lunchbox (his friend has a phone, you know he does). Now your kids kind of cool and you’re the cool mom who know about technology.

If you’ve never tried reading a QR code before, download the app and try this one I just made up:

You can make up your own QR codes at Kaywa. Or even better, have your kid make some up.

The idea for this post came from this smart and funny blog I’ve been following for years, Ironic Sans (if you know your typography, the title is funny).

Kids love reading about what’s happening in their world.

But so often, the newspaper is full of inappropriate and difficult articles.

Teaching Kids News (TKN) is a sister website to Getting Kids Reading. We offer kid-friendly news articles, taken from the headlines of real newspapers.

One of the great things about TKN is that kids can read the articles themselves and parents don’t have to worry that they’ll be exposed to scary stories or inappropriate language. However, TKN doesn’t shy away from the hard news. We covered the Japan earthquake, the ousters in the Middle East and hockey violence. Of course, we’ve also presented stories on undiscovered tribes, Justin Bieber and Harry Potter.

TKN uses kid-friendly language and a ton of context to explain ideas that adults tend to know automatically, but which would be new to most kids.

Thousands of teachers and home-schoolers use TKN every day because each article includes “curriculum connections” to create an instant lesson plan.

During the school year TKN offers daily news articles; in the summer we present weekly articles and there are more than 150 great articles in our archives.

This week’s article is about some new 3-D photos of the Titanic. Very cool.

Here at GKR we’re always looking for cool literacy games.

Cool + literacy? Not the easiest combo.

Nevertheless, we’ve found you one. This game is retro, so you know it’s cool. (For future reference: if it looks like something we would have played in the 70s, it’s cool. Just so ya know.)

langman is hangman plus… well, something starting with an l. Basically it’s hangman with a platform gaming element.

(Update: Here’s a link to langman.)

Instead of just typing in the letters you want to guess like regular online hangman, you steer a little guy over to the letter using your keypad. If you guess wrong, the letter drops into space and tries to take you with it. As you proceed in the game, it becomes more difficult to reach the letters you want. There’s a lot of hopping and running and leaping. (Maybe the l is for leaping?)

The little man ends up in all sorts of difficulties, like having a big block fall on the letter he wants to select and having to figure out how to move the thing. If you guess wrong too many times you could be left with vast craters which become unjumpable (which is what the R-reset button is for.)

langman was created by Ehren von Lehe , who was nice enough to send us these great screen shots. He wants you to know that you can also customize the words the game uses, adding in some of your own. I think you hit “E” to get into the level editor to do that – but frankly that would require someone more technologically oriented than me… like, say, your kid? (I tried to add Harry Potter and Dr. Seuss but then I got confused and then scared and then I bailed before I saved it properly. I’m sure your kid will do a lot better than me.) * See Update, below.

If you want, you (or your kid) can customize the vocabulary langman uses.

In order to play the game you have to download Unity, which is similar to Flash. At first I balked, but I think Unity is becoming quite popular (von Lehe points out that some big online games like Lego and Star Wars use it). Plus, my Norton program told me it was safe and I always listen to Mr. Norton.

As a literacy tool, it’s not bad. The real draw is that it’s fun and cool enough to keep kids engaged so if they want to play on the computer but you’d like them to do something that challenges their brain, langman may just be that happy medium you’re both looking for.

Thanks to Bart Bonte for pointing us towards langman.

*Update from Ehren von Lehe
To customize the vocabulary:
1. From the main menu, press E.
2. Delete all the text in the “Levels” text box. (This will cause it to just use the default levels.)
3. Enter your custom words and phrases in the Vocabulary text box.
4. Press the “New Game” button.

Viola! You’re now playing the game with your custom vocabulary.
If you want to change something, just press E to get back to the editor.

Thanks, Ehren!

This has nothing to do with literacy. Well, unless there’s something called “animal literacy” (which there’s not).

But some things just have to be shared. Stick with it past the Michael Jackson bit – it gets really good.

The new edition of Literacy Lava, a free e-zine for parents with great literacy articles and ideas, is now available.

You can download the .pdf from The Book Chook, here.

I’ve got an article in it, and there are lots of other great articles including:
* Writing tips for kids;
* Story-telling;
* Literacy tips – what works (that’s my article);
* Tips for reading aloud;
* A book club for preschoolers:
* Creativity tips; and
* much more.

Image: D.Salhundi, Karnatak, India

Here’s why we say you should “scatter books around the house.”

I want you to watch this exciting speech by Sugata Mitra on TED.com that illustrates the extent to which kids can teach themselves.

Through his “Hole in the Wall” project he conducted a series of experiments in 1999. He went to a slum in New Delhi, India and secured computers, hooked up to the Internet, into a wall so they could be used. And then he left.

The kids there had never used a computer before. And, the computer was completely in English—a language the kids didn’t speak or understand.

Within eight hours, an eight-year-old boy was not only surfing the Internet, but he was teaching a six-year-old friend how to browse.

The kids taught themselves how to use the PC, and the Internet—in English—and they began teaching each other.

He conducted the many more experiments which supported his theory that when they’re left alone, with the right resources, children are able to self-instruct to an incredible degree.

So how does this apply to literacy? It’s simple: Scatter books around your house. Put a book on his bed. Put a book in the bathroom. Leave a book poking out from under his dresser. Leave a book on the kitchen table.

If you leave a kid alone with a good book, he will pick up the book and start flipping through it. Soon, he will become interested in it. He will read.

Here is the speech (it gets really interesting at about 7:33).

We’ve just launched an exciting new website that offers kid-friendly news articles.
Teaching Kids the News provides daily news articles, appropriate for kids (approximately grades 1-6).
Some articles also have ESL (English as a Second Language) versions.
The site can be used by parents; by teachers in the classroom; by homeschoolers and by kids themselves.
Every article also has “Curriculum Connections,” which tie it to school curriculum – including grammar points and discussion points.
I’m working with two amazing educators on this site, Jonathan Ophek and Kathleen Tilly, who are passionate about education and want kids to have access to “real” news – not what marketers want them to read.
Please drop us a line and let us know what you think!

Won’t you adopt a word?

You don’t normally think of the Oxford English Dictionary people as silly, but they’ve developed a project that’s pretty goofy, and it’s something you can do with your kid to get her thinking about language.

They’ve rounded up hundreds of words that don’t get used much any more. Words like gumfiate (to swell), lambition (licking) and vellicle (something that pinches or holds fast).

They’ve taken all of these nearly extinct words and knitted them into a virtual quilt, which you’ll find here.

When you move your mouse over the words, they’ll call out to you: “Pick me! Pick me!” They want you to adopt them.

You can find a word or two that you like and click on them. That will bring up its definition, and a form that allows you to “adopt” it. (Like all adoptions, you first have to register. Unlike human adoptions, it’s free.)

Adopting a word means pledging that you’ll try to bring it back into the mainstream. You’ll use it in conversation and in writing, and you’ll explain it to people.

Save a Word is meant to be a fun concept to get people thinking about words. It’s a great resource to use to talk to your child about the fact that words evolve and how our language has changed.

WORDS is a brilliant short (1:54) film that blends images to create a flowing “word poem” that is lovely, fun and thought-provoking.
It starts out with “play,” which leads to “blow” and then “break” and “split” and then “run.”

The images examine all aspects of the words. For instance, “run” is a person running, and then a runny nose, running a red light and running away… which leads to fly, and fly (zipper), and fly (work), and then fall… falling down, falling in love, waterfall, the Fall…

They used YouTube images to produce something really mesmerizing. Watch it with your kid, to bring new sense to some basic words and concepts and what they mean to us.

Re:WORDS from Everynone on Vimeo.

Thank you, Everynone, for this brilliant word poem. And BoingBoing for bringing it to our attention.