iLiveMath: Animals of Africa is another wonderful app from iHome Educators. It is one in a series of word problem apps with themes that include Oceans, Winter Sports, Animals of Asia, Speed, Trains, Ford cars, Farm Fresh, and Entomology.
In Animals of Africa, students can solve word problems on three levels. Level I is addition and subtraction, Level II is multiplication and division, and Level III adds percents, mean, median, mode, and range. Each word problem is paired with a stunning photograph an animal. There is a ‘picker wheel’ for choosing the correct answer, which is confirmed or not.
Other features include links to articles and youtube videos about the animals, the capability of showing the program to a whole class using a VGA adapter, and a function to email results of the student’s session to parents or teachers. The report not only includes the number of correct, incorrect, and skipped problems; it also shows the problems worked on, with the equation, so the adult will be able to tell the student’s strengths and weaknesses.
Word Problems are a challenging area for many students. With this app, I’ve had students work to solve up to 20 problems before stopping. And that was without accessing the videos or articles. Learning the correct answer immediately is a good motivator.
iliveMath: Animals of Africa is available in the iTunes store for $4.99.
Barth Educational Consultants 