Children's Association for Nature » game

Searther

Mina — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 20:49:50 +0000

Searther (formerly blackle.org) is a way of getting news about the environment that is reliable, diverse, but not overwhelming or depressing. There is a points system and it is almost like a game, and there are also secrets in the site that you can find using clues. It is well done and continues to improve. And if you search with thier browser instead of using Google, you basically are giving money to an environmental cause without paying anything! Check it out, but take the points with a grain of salt. Getting other people to join doesn’t really help the environment very much, and neither does rating their articles. Remember to help the environment directly and in your everyday life.

There are almost 500 great articles on Searther. If you are not interested in the five articles in the ‘news reel’, insert “http://www.searther.org/readArticle.php?id=” into your browser’s address bar and follow it by a number from 1-450.

By the way, you can’t rate or comment on articles that are not in the news reel. So don’t think you can get 2,250 free points.

Become an Official Energy Hog Buster

Mina — Sun, 03 May 2009 16:52:40 +0000

Energy Hog (the kid’s part) is an animated website in the form of a game where you can learn how to become an official energy hog buster. You have to beat 5 games and when you are done you get a printable certificate. Only five major energy hogs are covered (with some notes on how to prevent other things from being energy hogs) but it is still good if you don’t know a lot about energy hogs. Just do not take the games and the pictures literally!

Scratch

Mina — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:16:11 +0000

Scratch is a programming language— sort of. It has a super user-friendly interface, is designed to be easy for kids as young as six years old and still be fun for adults. All you have to do is snap ‘blocks’ together. You can use it to make 2D games, movies, simulations, and all kinds of other stuff. Then, you can post it on the Scratch website and other users put comments and ‘love-its,’ which are a form of rating system. All of the games can be downloaded and built on by other users, and Scratch automatically gives the original creator credit. As if this isn’t awesome enough, you can embed your games in your website.

If you make an environmental game in Scratch, get the embed code and make a post on this website. Switch your editing mode to ‘HTML’ and paste in the embed code. Then put your post in the Games category, and it will show up on the Games page.

Scratch is FREE. You can download it from the website. There is lots of helpful stuff on the website to help you get started.