"Appy" Friday {June 13}

We used our iPads in our classroom quite a bit this year, but I never really got to writing about different apps we use.  I'm always on the lookout for great apps to help my students out.  I'm planning to write about an app or two each Friday this summer.  If you have ideas, I'd love for you to share them with me (us) too!

Today I want to share the app "Hideout" with you.  This is a free early reading app created by Brigham Young University.

This is one of my students' favorite apps.  I don't remember where I discovered it, but when I first put it on the iPads, it only had 3 word endings.  It now has 6 different word endings.

This is the home screen for the app.  You choose your word endings from here.

The music is very catchy (think Carmen Sandiego) , and you will probably have it in your head most of the day :).  For each ending there is a little introduction where it tells you the sound of each individual letter followed by telling you sound the 2 letters make together.  There are then 4-6 words that you make for each word ending.  Once you've made the words, you get to play a game using those same words you just made in the previous part of the app.  After playing the game, you read about what you did during the game. You read by tapping each word; it lights up and reads the words to you.

This is the screen where it introduces the sounds of each letter and the sounds of the letters when put together. 

This app was a favorite of many students, but one would play this app any chance he had.  He had lower reading skills compared to his peers, but I noticed that through playing this app (and lots of intervention) he picked up on word families (as opposed to sounds in isolation) and was particularly strong with word families featured on this app.

I think it is worth a download, and you certainly can't beat the price!  Let me know what you think!