We had some fantastic entries to our Dress Your Teacher or Parent as a Monster competition last month – including headless heads, creepy zombies, monster mummies and devillish dads!
Thank you all for entering the competition.
Our judges, Ceri Williams and his student, Jack came to a nail-biting decision last week.
They decided to award the winning prize to Bryan Clark and his 3 sons for their amazing recreation of H.P Lovecraft’s monster Cthulhu.
Congratulations Bryan and the boys! You will receive £150 worth of Usborne books of your choice.
Here’s what Ceri said about the competition:
“We thought all the entries were absolutely fantastic and lots of hard work went into the costumes but in a photo-finish, Jack thought the fabulous Alien just about edged it.”
Runners-Up
Our runners-up have been decided too and £75 worth of Usborne books will each go to Lisa Waugh for her terrifying Zombie and to ‘monster mummy” Emily Morris.
Congratulations Lisa and Emily!
Thanks to everybody who entered the competition. We had a brilliant time looking at all the marvellous costumes. To look at all of the monster entries, go to our Facebook gallery.
They’ll be another competition early next year so watch this space!
The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) announced the nominations for the 2013 British Academy Children’s Awards last month and we’re delighted to say that Teach Your Monster to Read: First Steps has been nominated in the Children’s Interactive category. What a great honour and reward for the game!
Teach Your Monster to Read was launched by the Usborne Foundation, a charitable fund set up by Peter Usborne and his children, Nicola and Martin, to support initiatives to develop early literacy.
The Children’s BAFTA ceremony will be held on Sunday 24 November 2013 at the London Hilton in Park Lane. The ceremony will be presented by Jake Humphrey.
Teach Your Monster to Read may win the BAFTA (that would be a lovely bonus!) but at the end of the day the team is really proud that Teach Your Monster to Read has proved successful, is really helping children learn to read and that they LOVE playing it.
Here’s the list of all the Children’s BAFTA nominations. http://awards.bafta.org/award/2013/childrens
We’re launching an exciting new competition for the best, most monstrous costumes – just in time for Halloween!
We would love to see some terrible teachers, repulsive parents, terrifying TAs and horrible Headteachers dressed up in all manner of scales, teeth, warts and claws!
We’re obviously hoping that our wonderful teachers and parent fans will involve the children in the design of their monster costume too (eek – this sounds scary!).
Send in photos to [email protected] or enter via Facebook using this link.
The winner will receive a £150 bundle of Usborne books for their school or home and two runners up will each receive a £75 bundle of Usborne books.
How to enter.
1. Take a picture of you wearing your monster outfit
2. Send in a photograph with your name and school to the following address [email protected] or enter via our Facebook page.
4 Closing date 7th November 2013
Entries will be judged by Ceri Williams. Ceri Williams is a specific learning difficulties tutor for Torfaen LEA and Jazz musician. Thanks Ceri!
Terms and Conditions for the competition can be found here: Competition Terms and Conditions
Good Luck! We cannot wait to see those monster costumes!
Long before the summer days kicked in (the best summer the UK has had in years it must be said!), we ran a competition to design a monster for the new game ‘Fun With Words’.
We received a whopping 500 monster entries to the competition, and after some hard deliberation by our judges, it was decided that the monster ‘Garbage’ drawn by Tanzina (age 10) would be featured in the new game.
Here’s Tanzina’s drawing next to the finished ‘Garbage’, illustrated by the fantastic Rich Wake. Wow! This monster can now be made by adding all these various body parts together at the beginning of the game.
Here’s a short time-lapse video of Rich bringing the monster to life. It’s fun to see the monster take shape!
Runner-up news!
Our competition runner-up Devlon has also been busy. Devlon created the brilliant monster Ogo (one of my personal favourites).
Here’s what Devlon said about the competition:
“I am really proud to be a runner up. My friend helped me to choose the books and Mrs Stephens (The Head Teacher) was really pleased as we need books for our new library. I can’t wait to play the new game!”
Here’s Devlon with Ogo and with his friend Angus – reading their winning books! Hooray!
To view all our amazing competition monsters then take a look at ‘The Monster Gallery” on Flickr.
We’ll be launching a new competition next week – just in time for Halloween. Watch this space!
The monsters have an exciting opportunity to announce!
We’re looking for teachers who can give up an hour of their time to talk about the game. We’d like to ask you what you like, what you don’t like and to show you a few new ideas for features.
We’re looking for some participants who can come to visit us (at the famous Usborne Publishing offices in London) and some from elsewhere in the world that can talk to us via Skype.
In return we can offer £150 of free Usborne books, a credit on the website, and we’ll cover your expenses if you’re travelling in to meet us in person.
So, if you’ve used the game, know it relatively well and would be interested in helping out, please get in touch with us at [email protected] and we’ll let you know more.
The monsters are really looking forward to meeting you!
Teach Your Monster to Read 2: Fun With Words has now launched. Hooray!
This game is designed for children who have mastered our first game: Teach Your Monster to Read: First Steps and takes your monster on a brand new journey through a spectacular kingdom of hidden treasure, balloon flights and spaceship rides.
Meeting new characters along the way, such as the Hungry Word Beast, the Space Pirates and the mischievous “Trickies”, the monster is on a quest to find his lost spaceship. Throughout his adventure, the monster will collect gold stars which can be exchanged for fantastic prizes.
And just like “First Steps”, the new game is completely free!
The game features the voices of Simon Farnaby from BBC’s Horrible Histories, and for the first time, Mr Thorne from ‘Mr Thorne Does Phonics’. Exciting!
Find out more
Compare the educational content of the “Fun With Words” with “Teach Your Monster to Read: First Steps
Find out what the game covers in the full Game Overview (PDF)
Play the demo
How to play
You can access the game through your usual Teach Your Monster to Read account – just sign in and follow the instructions.
Get in touch and let us know what you think of the new game, we’d love to hear your thoughts!
We’re thrilled to announce that our new game, Teach Your Monster to Read 2: Fun With Words will feature the wonderful Mr Thorne from Mr Thorne does Phonics!
Mr Thorne will be voicing the letter sounds and words in the new game, bringing his original, clear and engaging voice (and of course his enthusiasm) to Teach Your Monster to Read. It’s going to be an unstoppable partnership!
Mr Thorne is a UK-based teacher whose highly-respected YouTube site Mr Thorne Does Phonics contains over 500 literacy videos and has fast become an internet sensation.
His materials have been viewed in schools around the world, and his reading and spelling apps have been in the top 30 educational apps in over 50 countries worldwide. We’re very lucky to have him on the team!
For more about about Mr Thorne go to YouTube or www.mrthorne.com
Teach Your Monster to Read 2: Fun With Words will be available to play next Wednesday. Watch this Space!
The Parachute Game is an exciting new mini-game in Teach Your Monster to Read 2: Fun With Words.
Your monster holds tight to a parachute as he floats down through the clouds. While floating down, he has to collect the right letters and sounds to make up the word before he reaches the ground safely.
The monster is rewarded with stars which can be exchanged for clothing, equipment and food in the shop.
This game helps the player practise blending and segmenting of individual words.
Click on this link for more information about Teach Your Monster to Read 2: Fun with Words.
Who is The Shopkeeper?
Scariness 1 Speed 3 Special Powers 2 Size 7 Appetite 5
At the end of each level your monster meets a very friendly shopkeeper. This shopkeeper offers the monster a chance to buy some goodies with the stars he has collected on his journey. This part of the game is one of the monster’s favourites!
The shopkeeper sells all kinds of equipment, food and clothing, from bright yellow wings, to a bucket and spade, a new brown belt or a large top hat. The monster can only purchase items that he can afford so he must choose wisely or save his stars for the next journey.
Happy shopping!
Click on this link for more information about Teach Your Monster to Read 2: Fun with Words.
Who are The Trickies?
Scariness 3 Speed 10 Special Powers 7 Size 4 Appetite 2
The Trickies are the speediest characters in the new Teach Your Monster to Read game. They appear in the villages and along the journey and pop up out of nowhere and they don’t stay still for long!
Your monster is excited if he finds a Tricky as one of the main aims of the game is to collect them all.
The Trickies each carry a tricky word, such as: he, she, no, go, have, like. They jump into sentences when the monster comes near them. The monster must practice the Trickie’s sentence 3 times to get the tricky word right. It’s hard work, but once the monster has practised the sentence the Trickie becomes the monster’s friend and stays with him until the end of the game
The Trickies love it when your monster gets the words right and are really excited to be reunited with all their Tricky friends!
Click on this link for more information about Teach Your Monster to Read 2: Fun with Words.
