I am not going to lie, home schooling a 5, 9 and 11 year old has posed it challenges. The mornings follow a school led programme, lunch almost a marker for something other than “school-directed” learning. “Free-time technology” is only available “after school” or 3pm, so we have been looking for “activities” to fill that void. After reading, colouring, crafting, creating Triptico activities, we have explored VR & AR with expeditions, had an semi-successful attempt at online gaming in French. We are still enjoying Morgan Rice’s Rise of the Dragons via Google Play Books (titles also available via Audible). We didn’t get to ‘The Two Gentleman of Verona,’ live here though we are also aware of ‘Culture in quarantine,’ offer from the RSC and the National Theatre Live productions on YouTube over the next two months, with One Man Two Guvnors last night.
- Thursday 9 April: Jane Eyre by Sally Cookson
- Thursday 16 April: Treasure Island by Bryony Lavery
- Thursday 23 April: Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare
Might and Magic
More recently, for our eldest, we headed over to Uplay and grabbed a copy of “Might & Magic: Chess Royale,” an autobattler with a difference. Plenty of hidden reading, numeracy and strategy thinking. See the advert here.
Plenty of reading learning how to play. For example “Make sure that your most resistant units are placed on the frontline.” What does ‘resistant’ and ‘frontline’ mean. Plenty of hidden numeracy and budgeting, purchasing characters, managing health, managing and evaluating the character abilities. Plenty of strategy, selecting and shuffling selections between rounds, comparing and evaluating character factions and abilities (HP, magic resistance) using character “synergies” to activate bonus effects that are key to swinging battles in your favour… and much more.
With my simple understanding. At the start of each match you create your army, selecting where to place your characters / units on your side of the battlefield / board. Your army is then matched against an opponent’s army online automatically, to the death (apart from on the rare occasion where a long match ends in a draw).
Most autobattlers tend to be last-man-standing. Chess Royale’s 99-player matches are bigger than most, ending when all but one player has lost all three lives.
Harry slowly improved his strategy, hence his rankings, managing three top 10 finishes. He was enthused enough to drag his younger sister into battle. On PC and app.
Ubisoft deserve recognition for their swift support of self-isolating – “Play your part, play at home.” The headline free title being ‘Rayman Legends’ with free trials and more game titles planned for later this month over at free.ubisoft.com/.
Meanwhile over at the BBC there is Nightfall.
A fantastical adventure game that brings kids together to connect, play and get lost in a mystical world.
In it, players become Nightfallers, defenders of the Dream, and work together to defeat Nightmares. Available as an app and in the browser.
We have not explored the worlds of Nightfall yet, maybe this afternoon?