Are you a Key Stage 1 teacher? Do you know how difficult it is to find good quality KS1 websites? We had a similar problem when showing fun websites to teachers during our VLE training sessions. Until we found i-board. By the way, there’s some KS2 stuff here too…so please don’t run away 🙂

Let me take you to BETT 2009, I was there for a couple of days, wandering aimlessly looking for fun software to use within our VLE. I had a brief to find some Early Years software and i-board caught my eye. The activities are simple, can be extended and are brilliant for little children. After BETT we were provided with 70 activities to share with our teachers. On returning to BETT in 2010, we found out that they are now all FREE. Yup. FREE.

So what’s so good about i-board? The thing that my KS1 colleague loves is that a lot of the activities are open ended, rather than being right/wrong.The activities are so good that KS2 people always ask where their content is…I remind them that most of the internet is geared towards KS2, there’s very little for KS1!!

My favourite thing is that the makers of i-board have thought about teachers using the games elsewhere. In VLE training we look at downloading thumbnails of the activities and linking the game within ou VLE. I-board is made for this and of course if it is linked within your VLE/school website, the younger children can access it easily.

Another benefit is that some of the activities are not for children at all, they are for teachers to use on their whiteboard, maybe as part of a starter or plenary.

So, let me show you some of my favourite activities:

• Dance Moves – Control the bear using the arrows
• Adding 2 digit numbers – Try partioning the numbers, then adding them together
• At the vets – Measuring and weighing animals (Easily KS2!!)
• A day at the beach – Can you write some sentences about the pictures?
• Habitat Manager – Make a habitat and populate it with minibeasts (what happens if the ants can’t get to their habitat? VERY funny)
• Postcard Maker – Where has Bear been?
• Where is the bear? – Does what it says on the tin

Notable mentions also go to Cheese Sniffer, Chicken Catapult and Woodland disco for having good names!

If you want to see the guide I made for embedding i-board in our VLE, feel free to download it here