Sushi Monster
This week, we chose an app of our choice and did a tutorial about it. I chose to go the game route and find a game that my students could use to enhance learning and material that has already been taught by me. I took me quite awhile to find an app that I thought would be worth doing a tutorial over. A lot of the ones that I downloaded and tried out were not good. Some you had to pay to use them which I think is ridiculous. Why should we have to pay for a subscription to games that enhance our students' learning? Others just were not quality games that I would want my students to play or use. In the end, I did find one that I thought was alright; it is called Sushi Monster. Basically there is a monster in the middle that has a number on his belly. Students drag sushi (numbers) that add up or multiply together to equal the number on the monster. So if the number is 6, then students would drag the appropriate numbers to the monster and he would eat them. (More details in my video below, because some of it is hard to explain if you aren't looking at the app.) Details about the app include, it is currently only available on iOS devices, and is free to download and use-no subscription of any kind is needed. The description from the app store says, " Meet Sushi Monster! A game to practice, reinforce, and extend math fact fluency is completely engaging and appropriately challenging." The app is made by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, the company that provides resources to teachers including Math in Focus®-the math curriculum that is used in the Manhattan/Ogden district. I think there is several ways you can use this app in your classroom. One way is to let students play it individually and reinforce their learning by themselves. You could also use this as a class activity where you as a teacher displays your iPad on the screen at the front of the class and you go through the activity as a class. There a couple things that I don't like about this app. One is that there really sent very many levels-only seven addition levels and five multiplication levels. I wish there was more of both. Also, I wish you could pick a grade level. Right now, the app doesn't have the option and it goes from ones, tens, hundreds, and thousands. Well, first graders can't add thousands, so I think it would be beneficial if you could select which grade level or what place value the problems are in. Overall, I would recommend this app for anyone who needs a game that is fun yet challenging to use in their classroom!
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