Comments on: The ABCs of learning online

Teaching toddlers online is getting easier, thanks to Starfall and other learning Web sites that are growing fast.

[twinkie1cat]

Starfall

I found Starfall several years ago and have used it with mentally handicapped students for quite a while. Even though it is meant for little children, the older ones who are moderately to severely disabled love it too. This site is a great resource. My only complaints are that the more advanced stories are not read out loud. As a special educator I feel that some kids need this kind of support.

ONe really nice thing is the part where the student dresses the little figure, designs a face for it and has it do an activity. You can get considerable insight into how a child sees himself or wants to be from this kind of fun project.

[Maulbeere_mond]

I like Noggin and NickJr

Surprised that these aren't mentioned here wrt preschoolers. They're free, and there's no logging in. Young kids can learn shapes and colors, relationships and contrasts, animals, basic language and so on, watch music videos like Laurie Berkner, Wiggles etc, and more at a level preschoolers can enjoy. Wonder what other great toddler sites aren't on the radar?

[museitupeditor]

Getting Writers Involved

It's heartwarming and very encouraging to see many online venues, safe venues, for our children. Every imaginable avenue has to be created in order to get our future young muses involved in reading and writing.

Several writers have band together to bring the love of reading and writing to our schools across Canada and the United States. Musing Our Children will be an ongoing project, offering tips and suggested reading material for various age levels through our site and our FREE newsletter, Pages and Pens - your tools to imagination!

We will be hosting a Reading and Writing Appreciation Week on October 15 - 19 and inviting writers, storytellers, and illustrators from around the world to participate.

For more information, please go to our site at:
http://musingourchildren.tripod.com/

We've already placed several FREE handouts for writers and teachers to download and use during a writer's visit.

Our mission statement is to offer a child the benefits of reading and writing and together we can make a difference.

Lea Schizas

[sadchild]

starfall is great

my friend's son recognizes all letters and numbers, can count to 10, count the number of items in front of him, tell the shape, color and recognizes about 30 words (up, me, go, hi, bee, car, hat, cat, dog, egg, truck...) and it is the result of his parents spending about an hour every other day at starfall.com.

he turns 2 years old in a few weeks.