Bien sûr this is a great app! Your French language learners will want to snatch up a tablet and practice their vocabulary all the time. With nine entertaining games, the app will teach pupils necessary vocabulary and phrases in a jiffy.
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App Overview
Learn French - MindSnacks is a French vocabulary app composed of nine unique games. The games test a variety of skills, including recall, error recognition, vocabulary mastery, grammar, spelling, categorization, image recognition, and more. The game comes with two unlocked games. It's up to you to level up and unlock the other seven! Along the way, you will be presented with side quests and achievements that increase your experience and add some extra motivation.
How to Get Started:
- Log in or create an account
- Choose your French level
- Nonexistent
- Jumbled up words without any structure
- Halting sentences with OK grammar
- Fast & confident
- Go through a brief tutorial that points out the different buttons in the app
- Touch each word in your first lesson to hear it read aloud
- Start your lesson with a game of Swell, the first of the two unlocked games
Access to Lessons:
- Learn French - MindSnacks comes with one free lesson
- In order to learn more words, you must upgrade
- A French Pass costs $4.99 and comes with 50 lessons related to grammar, reading, and conversation
- In all 50 lessons, there are 1000+ words to learn accompanied by a group of motivating side quests
- For $19.99, you can buy all 400 lessons in the MindSnacks series, which cover eight subjects: Portuguese, French, German, Japanese, Spanish, Italian, Mandarin, SAT
Viewing and Choosing Lessons:
- Press the book in the top right corner or drag the menu page to the left to view your lessons
- Lessons are categorized into two groups: Current and Mastered; touch any word to hear it read aloud
- The app moves straight down the list of lessons; if you want to focus on something specific, open the menu and choose any topic
- The list of topics is comprehensive and includes basic language building blocks and as well as complicated expressions
- You will notice the app adapting to your abilities; it will repeat words that you find difficult and bring in previously mastered words to make sure you still know them
- Practice all mastered words by tapping on the Mastered tab and pressing Play
Game Features:
- Fun music that changes for every game
- Adorable graphics and amusing animations
- Proper pronunciation of every word by a native speaker
- Progress tracking for individual words
- Results and scorecard for each game
- Restart, pause, and random options are available
On Your Profile, Track:
- Active days
- Hot streaks
- Mastered words
- Lessons finished
- Image recognition
- Error recognition
- Rapid recall
- Spelling
Instructional Ideas
Multiple users can sign up for MindSnacks on a single device. If you only have access to a few tablets at a time, set up centers. Pupils can sign up and then later on select their profile from the list.
The app is meant for a single user, so there is not much functionality for the whole class. The games are great individual activities. If you want some control over what your students are learning, you can assign lessons of your choice. This way, class members can select these from their lessons menu and focus on common topics. Practice in class, or assign MindSnacks for homework your class will gladly complete.
Classroom Considerations
Words in the earlier lessons are all depicted by cute drawings. However, words in some of the latest lessons are represented by photographs instead. The photos vary in quality, so glance over all of the words and accompanying pictures before assigning certain lessons.
Class members who play Learn French - MindSnacks will become absorbed in the material, and have a great time while learning vocabulary and phrases. However, it is not a replacement for French class. The app lacks some depth in instruction on grammar, conjugation, and sentence structure. Also, while playing the games, users are never asked to speak or compose sentences. Writing and conversation will need to practiced outside of the app.
MindSnacks offers bulk licenses to schools for 50 percent off. Take a look at their website if you want to find out more.
Pros
- Material is scaffolded
- Reteaching and progress tracking is built in
- Always engaging
- Practice is encouraged
Cons
- Users are never asked to speak or write sentences
- Designed for independent use