Our Grade Ones love using 'Teach your monster to read'

The online version of Teach Your Monster to Read is free and my Grade 1s love it.  I allow them to use it in the last 10 minutes of our computer lessons https://www.teachyourmonstertoread.com/. Whenever I announce that it is time to play our reading game, I get a chorus of 'Yays'!

What is Teach your Monster to Read? 

This literacy game has been funded by the Usborne Foundation, a charity set up to support initiatives to develop early literacy. The program is free if you use it online, but you pay to use it as an app.  

The game is for children in the first stages of learning to read, or for older children who need a bit more practice. There is a video trailer on the Home page of the online version of 'Teach your monster to read' that shows how the game works. 

How does it work?

The information provided on the website version says, "The game takes children on a magical journey, meeting colourful characters along the way and collecting fantastic rewards. When children are engaged, they’re motivated to learn. As they progress, they rehearse a range of essential reading skills; matching letters to sounds, blending, segmenting, tricky words and reading full sentences."

Commonse Sense Media provides great reviews of programs on their website. This is one of their reviewers, Caryn Lix, says about "Teach Your Monster to Read" https://bit.ly/3cSm4Zt. 

"Teachers can have students play the game at home or at school. Each student creates an account, which allows teachers to monitor their progress through a dashboard, including how often they play, what games they're playing, and how well they're doing. This makes it a great way to assess basic reading and prereading skills as well as a fun way for kids to learn, on their own time and on their own terms. Students can also use the story as a starting point to come up with their own creative ideas: Write stories about how their monster damaged its ship, for example, or design their monster's home world in art class. Flash cards also provide an opportunity for students to review frequently confused sounds." 

How do you enrol students as a teacher?

You go to the website and sign up for a free teacher account. After that you create multiple players and give each student their login credentials.  The players log in to thir account and play. The app keeps a record of where they are at. As a teacher you can track their progress. The players can use these login credentials to log in to the app on any device, even when they're at home.

All I do in my Grade 1 Google Classroom is provide the link to the login page.  The students click on that and then each one signs in with their credentials - and they start playing and learning.

This is a great online game to add to your Grade 1 collection!