Educational Games

I’ve recently found two new FREE games online that I think are a lot of fun. Not only are these educational games fun but they are also great learning tools.  You could use these games as a teacher or as a parent or heck even just for fun if you are an adult

• The first one is Budget Hero. 
  • I had ridiculous amounts of fun with this.  It lets you control where your tax dollars go and how much taxes the country takes in and based on that tells you when the economy would go belly up!  Pretty cool stuff…shows you can’t be a hero to all and keep the country out of financial peril.  I think this would be a fantastic site to use in government, economic, history, civics, or even math classes for grades 8-12.  LOVED it. 
• Next is My Savings Quest
  • First you make your character, always fun.
  • Then you pick a career that will influence the types of ‘problems’ you have to solve.  A detective gets critical thinking questions, an accountant math, and an archeologist history and society type questions.  Have to earn that monthly check!
  • You also get to pick what kind of apartment you rent and how often you go out.
  • During the game you will get questions about spending extra money and sometimes you will lose money for random events like getting your car fixed.
  • Ultimately you are saving for a goal (which you get to pick) and at the end of six months you find out if you’ve met your goal
  • This is really fun and could be used in grades 4 and up.  It teaches about budgeting and goal setting and responsibility.  Great for a variety of classes.

I hope you will all go check these out!  Even if you don’t have a class to use them with right now they could go into your lesson plans for next year.  But….to be perfectly honest I like them so much I keep going back to them for myself.  Especially the Budget Hero.  It is really interesting to see how the changes you make effect the economy.  It’s made me rethink what I want in a president.

Try out the games and let me know what you think!  Will you use them in a class or with your own children?  Were they fun for you?