Games

**Geography can be fun! : http://geosense.net** This is a fun gaming site to help with geography skills. You can play alone or with someone else online. It is free and easy to sign in. It has very good instructions, and the games are easy and fun to play. You determine if you want a world map, advanced map, map of Europe or map of U.S. The computer will give you a location and you find it as quickly and as accurately as possible. You receive points for how well you do. Once again, you can play against an opponent or play alone. There is also chatting available while you play. This is not always appropriate for young children, however the site does block offensive language if it is used and warns users that the connection will be cut if it continues. There is a place for high scorers and you can choose your opponent. //Angela Whisenhant//  [|Library Gaming] This website has links to several examples of libraries using games. Some are creating their own game, one is using second life with teenagers, and some are circulating games. There is also a link to a resource page with books, articles, blogs and more. Susan Pratt
 * Educational online games:** [|**http://funbrain.com**]
 * This educational gaming site is aimed at K-8. It is filled with fun games that are fast moving and also educational. You can find games by subject matter, grade level or type of game. There are also web comics and web books, sudoku, teacher resources and an area for blogging. Grammar Gorillas is a great game for teaching the parts of speech. It asks you to identify a part of speech but also offers help at the bottom of the page so students have a resource to help them choose the correct anwer. This site would be excellent to have both in the classroom and the library because it covers all subjects at various levels.** //Angela Whisenhant//
 * Libsuccess: Gaming**


 * Up to Ten:** []. This resource is aimed specifically at younger children through elementary school age kids. It has some fun flash animation as well as games that relate to the main subjects being studied in school. This is a good site for summer learning because there are some downloadable activities and coloring pages to keep kids busy over the summer. Summer library programs, or after school library programs can use a site like this to keep young kids engaged with fun and appropriate online activities. --Meredith McNett


 * Online Games-maps, health, animals, history and more:** []. This site contains some great geography references. It has maps and games with world maps and also continent maps and individual country maps. It has games that function like assembling a puzzle with the different countries, states, etc. Any type of geography unit from elementary education up through middle school/junior high could find beneficial materials on this site. The school librarian could also direct a child studying geography to this site to quiz themselves or sharpen their skills. This site is much more dynamic than just using traditional print materials alone to teach or learn geography. --Meredith McNett


 * Fun Brain:** [|http://www.funbrain.com]. This site contains relevant games, flash cards and curriculum ideas in the areas of math, reading and grammar. The games contained in this site are the type that kids can play and not be aware that they are actually learning something. There are some classroom appropriate tools to print out and use in various units as well. These can also be relevant in a school library as this is a site that could be used during computer lab time or during free computer time. Some of the current popular books (Diary of a Wimpy Kid) have little activites and reading pages located on here as well, possibly getting the students to check out items in the print collection while they are in the library. --Meredith McNett


 * The Librarian’s Guide to Gaming: An Online Toolkit for Building Games at your Library.** [] This website focuses on creating advocacy for gaming in the library. The use of Gaming in the library would bring in more students, engage them, and encourage repeat visits. Libraries could use games as a tool to interest students and get them to visit the library. -- Amanda Lopez

The article, **Tabletop Fantasy RPGs** [|http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6624890.html]discusses how the use of RPGs and Fantasy RPGs can be used in a library setting as a way for players to examine real issues within the context of the game. Skills like teamwork, leadership, and communications are developed as students play RPGs. Libraries can have RPG tournaments that would involve students of all ages to help establish teamwork and leadership. -- Amanda Lopez

This website is a discussion forum where librarians can discuss the use of gaming in libraries. This includes their development, programs to use, role-playing games, and other gaming reviews and resources. It serves as a resource to librarians and provides different ways that gaming can be successful in the library. -- Amanda Lopez
 * LibGaming (Google Groups)** [|http://groups.google.com/group/LibGaming]

**Terra Libris: The Library RPG Project**-- [|http://www.theescapist.com/library/]. This site explains the use of RPG games in libraries as a way to promote reading, building relationships, and stimulate minds. Gaming can be used to promote literacy and used in ELA classes to idenitfy setting, characters, and plot in a more creative and fun way. This website also focuses on promoting the use of RPG games in the library and awareness of its library projects that utilize RPGs. It also shares resources, ideas, and networking for librarians who wish to start such a project. One idea was to have an RPG Library Day to raise awareness.--Amanda Lopez

Free Rice-- [|http://www.freerice.com] is a site that works with the United Nations World Food Program to donate 10 grains of rice for every correct answer. There is a bowl on the right side of the screen and you can see the rice pile up as you answe r correctly. Subjects include art, Chemistry, English grammar and vocabulary, Geography, languages (French, German, Italian and Spanish), basic math and multiplication. The game adjusts as you play, getting easier with consecutive wrong answers or getting more challenging with correct answers. This would be an excellent tool to drill any of the subjects listed above, and at the same time raising awareness for world hunger, allowing students to make a difference and help others while improving their vocabulary (or other area). --Allison Peterson

21st Century Information Fluency Resource Kit-- [|http://21cif.com/rkit/public.html] This is a site with all sorts of information about teaching information literacy including dozens of **games** that help teach these skills. A librarian or other teacher could use these games to introduce, teach, test, and/or reinforce concepts of the information literacy curriculum. Students might be more enthusiastic about learning these skills with the help of these games. For example, there are games that teach students how to turn questions into effective queries using keywords and operators.--Laurel Curtis--


 * Quia Web--** [|http://www.quia.com] is a place where educators from around the world can create and share their own games, quizzes, class web pages, surveys, and much more. Shared activities can be posted and searched under many subject areas, including Art, Chemistry, Foreign Languages (Spanish, French, German, etc.), Mathematics, and Music. Most of these activities provide a way for teachers to reinforce topics they have covered in class while incorporating technology into their classroom (or by visiting the library computer lab). This website could also be used by librarians to teach students about research processes or literary values/terms. A teacher or a librarian can either search the database of activities already available on Quia, or they can create their own experience for students while also sharing it with other teachers and librarians via the Internet.--Cora Padilla--


 * Carnegie Mellon Libraries: Library Arcade--** [|http://www.library.cmu.edu/Libraries/etc/index.html] is a website produced by graduate students for use in libraries. It is a website of games designed to help students improve their research skills. While this website is still under the final phases of development (as of May 2009), the games are available for use. A librarian could easily incorporate these games into a lesson that both reinforces students' researching skills and allows them to practice their computer skills. For example, one game requires students to shelve books in the correct places according to their catalog numbers. A librarian could use this game to reinforce students' understanding of the shelving system and numbers. Another game requires students to locate resources according to certain research topics. This could be used to help teach students how to sort and compile information. Although these games are not yet finished and still require some tweaking, it seems to be a really fun and interesting resource for librarians in the future.--Cora Padilla--


 * Oracle ThinkQuest: Education Foundation--** [|http://www.thinkquest.org/library/] is a website that allows educators and students to create and participate in online projects. Through ThinkQuest, a teacher or librarian can create a project that allows students from a particular class, a particular school, or all over the world to collaborate on a common goal. Or, they can simply join and participate in a project that has already been created on the website. ThinkQuest also offers three different types of competitions: a website competition, a narrative competition, or a local competition. For all three of these competitions, a teacher or librarian can design and create the framework of the competition in order to accomplish a certain educational goal. This website allows students to learn, explore, create and communicate through technology.--Cora Padilla--

This is a video of a talk presented by Professor Scott Nicholson of the Library Game Lab of Syracuse about Gaming in Libraries at the Bird Library at Syracuse. It is 52 minutes long and topics include: a definition for “games vs. gaming,” a discussion of the different types of games (web-based games, modern board games, party games, role-playing games, etc.), and results of a gaming survey in libraries. It discusses gaming policies in school libraries, curriculum vs. recreational gaming in school libraries, and uses of games in libraries. This is a great resource when analyzing and defending the introduction of a gaming program in a school library. (Amanda Cobb)
 * Gaming and Libraries talk ** - [|http://www.archive.org/details/librarygamelab_march2008talk]

This is an entry on a LibraryGamer’s blog that discusses gaming and state curriculum standards. The author links specific games to New York State’s standards in the areas of Social Studies, English Language Arts, Science and Technology, Health, Physical Education, and Family and Consumer Sciences. This is a great resource that provides a “jumping off point” for linking games to curriculum standards in other states. (Amanda Cobb)
 * Gaming, School Libraries, and the Curriculum **  - [|http://librarygamer.wordpress.com/2008/02/11/gaming-school-libraries-and-the-curriculum/]

This webpage provides one hundred resources for developing a gaming program in your library. It includes tips and links to articles and advice, blogs and groups, websites, books, and collections. This is a great resource that provides a wealth of information. While not specifically for school libraries, many of the resources provide information applicable to developing a gaming program in a school library. (Amanda Cobb)
 * Bringing Gaming (and Gamers) To Your Library : 100 Tips and Resources **  - [|http://oedb.org/library/features/bringing_gaming_100_library_resources]

HarperCollins Children’s Books – Kids Games and Contests [] This website contains games associated with the content of published HarperCollins’ books including //The Chronicles of Narnia, Amelia Bedilia, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, and Lemony Snicket’s Series of Unfortunate Events//. The games vary in activities including word searches, coloring, word scrambles, matching, and character games. These games could be used before, during, or after the reading of one of these books either in the library or the classroom as prereading or to further enhance the reading experience. – Stephanie Roe

Educational Games [] This website has games based on the achievements of Nobel Prize winners. The games help students to understand concepts such as Pavlov’s dogs, blood typing, and the electrocardiogram. The site includes information and readings on the topic as well as the actual winning of the Nobel Prize. This is an excellent site for older students to help further the understanding of these potentially difficult concepts. – Stephanie Roe

WebJunction - Group: Gaming in the Library [] This website shows how a small branch library in rural South Carolina used gaming in their library to bring in young patrons. Game time is allowed for everyone, but reading and book reports (as wells as community and self-improvement activities) are used as incentives to earn patrons additional time for playing. The library sees the program as a success. This incentive program or an adaptation of it could be implemented in almost any school library. – Stephanie Roe Trading Card Maker: Create a Trading Card from Your Digital Photos [] This website lets people create their own trading cards by using digital phots from files on your computer or from Twitter. You can make a whole deck to play a card game or give one to someone as a gift with their picture on it. This site would be fun to have in any library especially the children's section. I am going have a link for this site in my library which is a middle school. Kids can learn how to browse and get pictures and work on computer skills while having fun. This also enable them to be able to make a gift for someone like thier parents which is what many of my students have requested to do. - Kelly Alipour