Unmissable Apps, Sale and Giveaway

Unmissable Apps

Over the years we have all found things that we find useful in our teaching. Some things are indispensable - you know this when the kiddos are eager, and beg for something on a daily basis: "Miss, Miss, can we have...?" So I'm going to pass on a few of my favourites to you - no, I'm not on a commission, I just thought you'd like some ideas. Some have a cost attached, others don't. All are really useful and can be used as time fillers, or as more comprehensive lessons etc. Here's the first.

Education City

Not strictly an App, but I absolutely love this web-based tool. It's available in the US as well as the UK, and it's well worth a look. It's colourful with lots of appealing graphics for children. On the down side, the sound is a bit distracting (lots of bumps and beeps), but you could always turn that off.

You'll need to register and use a login name and password to gain access. Here's the screen shot:

Once logged in, you get to choose your age range:

As an example, let's click on F1:

You get a choice of three core areas to explore, in line with the National Curriculum (Core Standards in the US).

Now let's click on Year 2. Each area gives you a choice of subject: Literacy, Maths and Science. At an extra cost you can sign up for additional subject areas such as French, Spanish or German.

 Here I have clicked on Year 2 Literacy. This gives a choice of area broken down by National Curriculum area: word recognition and decoding, word structure and spelling, understanding and interpreting texts, text structure and organisation, and sentence structure and punctuation. There are a range of activities for each area. Here I have clicked on Intense Sports - an activity aimed at developing awareness of tenses.

The activities can be played individually or as a whole class on a whiteboard/smartboard. Children can also challenge children in other schools to play games - all anonymous and great for developing an element of competition.

Each activity is preceded by a short cartoon - the kiddos LOVE these..

You can print off activities as follow-up activities or for use in Centres. Individual work programmes can be devised and saved for each child in their My City area, so they can log in with their individual log in name and password and work on these activities at their own pace.

There is also an option to buy in to a homework programme - great for kiddos to work on at home. They work through the activities you set by the date you set. All scores are saved centrally on your class area so you can keep track of who has completed their homework and their scores.

There is a comprehensive teacher area where you can manage your class work, homework and My Cities.

Is this helfpul?

Do let me know what you think of this post. Was it helpful? Would you like to see more?

Sale and Giveaway

Just a quick reminder about the massive 50% sale I'm throwing until next Saturday 13th October, and my "Just Because..." Giveaway. To learn more, click the picture below.

Have a great day!