Thursday, June 12, 2014

Favorite Children's Websites



Favorite Children's Websites!

I decided to compile a list of my favorite and my children's favorite websites.  These are websites we visit often.  Some of them are educational and some are just for fun.  A lot of these I had no idea about when I was a teacher and I definitely wish I had!  I have gotten so many great ideas from many of these websites and I will be using them as part of my homeschool curriculum with my own kids.

We Give Books
My kids love being read to and this website hits the spot.  It's free to join and all of the content on the website is free.  There are books for different age groups and different interests.  The creators of this website do a Summer Reading Program with tons of different book options and links to specific activities you can do with your child while you're reading a book.  A lot of the books you find on the website are from popular series, such as Skippyjon Jones, Tinga Tinga Tales and the Spot books.


Starfall.com,
Where children have fun learning to read!    Starfall

I have been using this site with my oldest son ever since he was tiny.  It's a great way to introduce letters, letter sounds, numbers and colors and it's free.  The first time I was introduced to this site was while I was taking a college course in special education and I ended up using it in my classroom on a regular basis.  So many people I know have loved this website and it's great for kids of all interests and abilities.


PBS Kids
My kids love the games, movies and coloring pages on this website.  Each of the item on this website goes along with a PBS show.

Tumble Book
Tumble Book is a great website filled with read aloud stories.  My oldest is a new reader and I love that the website highlights the words of the story as the stories are being read aloud.  Most of the stories are ones I have never heard of but are crowd pleasers.  Something I love about this website is that with a number of the stories there is a A/R point level, a grade level, a lexile level and/or a common core standard.  Activities are also included with some of the books.  This is a paid website, but I do know some libraries have paid subscriptions through their websites.

Storyline Online and Read to Me 
These premise behind these websites are very similar so I decided to put them together.  In both websites there are celebrities reading the books aloud.  There is something so funny in seeing some of the celebrities you've seen play serious roles in movies and on TV, get incredibly silly while reading a children's book.  One thing the website Read to Me has that Storyline Online doesn't is lesson plans that go along with the different stories. 

I hope you enjoy these websites as much as my children and I do!
Shayna