DD2: Learning Apps and Instructional Games

Ansel & Clair’s Adventures in Africa by Cognitive Kid, Inc.

This is a great learning app that allows students to learn about Africa by taking a journey. Once the character, Marley, arrives in Africa, students are able to explore the Sahara, Serengeti, and Nile Valley regions. In every region, there are different milestones the students must click on and learn about in order to find the missing parts to their spaceship. These milestones include different species such as turtles and birds as well as different plants and trees that are found in the Nile River. After clicking on the animals and plants, the narrator gives some background information on where the plant or animals are found as well as some history about them. The student then has to take a picture of the animal or plant and sees a real picture to know how they look in the real world since the game is virtual. After learning about the animals and plants, Marley finds parts to his spaceship, which motivates the students to keep taking pictures and learning about regions in Africa. This app is a great learning tool for children from grades kindergarten to 5th grade and is a great resource for science teachers. This could fit into a larger lesson for students learning about various species. After playing this game, as a science teacher, I could assign a research project to students about a plant or animal species they learned about in Africa. The students could write a reflection and talk about some of the facts they learned about the animal and plant species. This game is an amazing way to keep students engaged and give them a desire to want to learn. In my tutorial of this app, I assigned students to state 3 facts they learned about a specific species (plant or animal) they learned about from the game. My goal was for them to be able to identify the species and learn about various species that live in the Nile River in Africa.

Kahoot by Kahoot

Kahoot is an app that can be used to create quizzes or surveys. I have actually used it in some of my classes before. It is a very fun way to assess students for teachers. Using this app, the teacher is able to create his/her own questions for the students to answer. The students then get a code to enter the same questionnaire on their own phone. It is fun because every student gets the same question at the same time. It becomes a competition because the faster they answer correctly, the more points they get rewarded with. After every question, the points are tallied up and Kahoot tells the students who is in the lead. The teacher also gets to see who got the questions wrong and who got them right. Kahoot supports student learning because it can be used as a form of assessment following a lesson. This app will allow the students to have fun and give the teacher an idea of which students understood the lesson and which students need more help.

WWF Together by World Wildlife Fund

WWF Together is a great app for science teachers. It is easy to use and navigate through. It is a good resource to use when teaching students about wildlife and endangered animals. Students are able to choose an endangered animal they would like to learn more about, such as a panda, jaguar, penguin, dolphin, etc. Once the animal is chosen, the app shows them different pictures of the animal and many facts about how they live. It teaches them about why they are an endangered species, where they can be found, and approximates the amount of animals that are left in the world today. It is a very cool way to introduce students to a lesson on endangered species. There are many ways teachers can incorporate this app into their science lesson. For example, a teacher can read a book about endangered animals, have the students play with this app, and then have them write a reflection or journal entry about an animal they learned about and what they found most interesting about that animal.

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