Ran across this via Karl Fisch yesterday.  Free Rice is an organization that is committed to helping feed the world.  They have developed this interesting – and free – web game that helps users build vocabulary while at the same time providing food for people in developing nations.

As users get correct answers – it’s a fairly simple vocabulary multiple choice game – a couple of philanthropic organizations will work with the UN Food Program to ship a few grains of rice.  The more success visitors have, the more rice gets distributed.

As Karl points out…

I think this is another interesting use of the web, combining educational activities (not just the fairly simple vocab building activity, but educating folks about hunger itself – including links to the sister site poverty.com) with contributing to the greater good. I could see this being a springboard for writing activities, social studies units on developing countries or poverty, and even some math and science activities (calculating how many grains of rice it takes to feed a certain number of people, nutritional value of the rice, caloric intake, etc.)

The program has been around for a while and has met with much success.  From the website FAQ…

The rice you donate makes a huge difference to the person who receives it. According to the United Nations, about 25,000 people die each day from hunger or hunger-related causes, most of them children. Though 20 grains of rice may seem like a small amount, it is important to remember that while you are playing, so are thousands of other people at the same time. It is everyone together that makes the difference. Thanks to you, FreeRice has generated enough rice to feed more than two million people since it started in October 2007.

They have recently added vocabulary from several subjects.  Check it out.  The start of some great conversations in many areas for you and your students.

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