Today I found a very interesting and brilliant online vocabulary game which is called Free Rice. I don’t know if you’ve already heard about it, but I can not help recommending it to you. Free rice is sponsored by the U.N. World Food Program. If you get one word correctly, they will donate 20 grains of rice to the poor to help end hunger. The rice is paid for by the advertisers whose names you see on the bottom of your vocabulary screen (see example shown in the picture above). As of today they have raised 22,478,677,910 grains of rice (see details here).
I really like this brilliant idea. Playing vocabulary game is associated with helping end hunger. What a big motivation! As we know, motivation is a key for success. I at once spent 5 minutes to try this game and I donated 380 grains of rice (see the picture above). It’s a small number, but I am very excited about it :). I decide to play more at my free time.
But, one problem is that, when I play this vocabulary game, it’s like doing the TOEFL test. I mean the vocabulary level is a little bit high for ESL learners, especially for beginning-level learners. I am wondering if Free Rice can add some levels particularly for ESL learners. If so, I believe our kids will spend an unexpected amount of time playing this game, to help the poor and to practice their English vocabulary at the same time.
I really like this brilliant idea. Playing vocabulary game is associated with helping end hunger. What a big motivation! As we know, motivation is a key for success. I at once spent 5 minutes to try this game and I donated 380 grains of rice (see the picture above). It’s a small number, but I am very excited about it :). I decide to play more at my free time.
But, one problem is that, when I play this vocabulary game, it’s like doing the TOEFL test. I mean the vocabulary level is a little bit high for ESL learners, especially for beginning-level learners. I am wondering if Free Rice can add some levels particularly for ESL learners. If so, I believe our kids will spend an unexpected amount of time playing this game, to help the poor and to practice their English vocabulary at the same time.
Don’t wait. This game is fun and simply brilliant. Check-it-out here.
3 comments:
Hey Jiao!
I happened to play Free Rice last Thanksgiving day after we had a big dinner. My friend, the hostess recommended us this game. Five of us tried this together, including three English language learners and two native English speakers. I've got to say some words are really hard. It's kind of adaptive test. The more you get correct, the harder it will be. A bunch of words were even unknown to the two native English speakers and they used a dictionary. I feel it's like GRE (even more difficult than GRE) rather than TOEFL (TOEFL is not that hard). There seems to be some rarely used words. But, it's really fun!
I feel the game, in essence, is a vocabulary test in the form of multiple choices. But the most interesting thing is that we can do something good while playing! Sure, it's a HUGE motivation. Also, earning some grains is a novel way to assess our performance. From an ESL major's perspective, I have some thoughts if we want to use it for ESL students. You're right. The level of the words is a key if we want to use for ELLs. Furthermore, without any visual or other clues, it is extremely hard for ESL students to find the right answers. So, most of time, it may turn to be a mere "guessing" game. I enjoyed it because there were two native speakers who discussed with us and explained some words in an interesting way. Or I doubt I would get frustrated and bored very soon.
Btw, how do you have Chinese characters here? Very cool~~:-)
Hi Zhuo,
I like your idea to provide some visual or other clues if we want to use Free Rice for our ESL kids. Otherwise, they will lose interest very soon.
Or even we can modify Free Rice to provide a 3D-animation e-gaming enviroment. Hence, player can answer questions more easily and get more motivation. And the award could be if the player answer one question correctly, they will get 20 grains of rice; and if they advance to a higher level, they will get more rice, let's say, 500 grains :)
Hey Jiao,
3D-animations surly will attact people. If they are interactive, that would be more fun! Anyway, this Web is really amazing. The most unique is not only having fun while learning but doing something good. I really like the idea.
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