These Child-Oriented Sites Are a Modern Interpretation of “quiet Play.”
Whether you’re a teacher, a parent, or just someone with a large family, you know how difficult it can be to keep a room full of children quiet, even for a short time.
One technique I use is timing how long children can remain quiet. For some reason, children really enjoy being timed. But this only works a few times, so it’s good to have as many other techniques on hand as possible. That’s why I was so intrigued by the plethora of websites that use laptop microphones to motivate children to be quiet. Some exploit children’s curiosity, for example, by displaying animated characters that appear if the group remains silent long enough. Others combine animation with good old-fashioned timers.
Here are a few options you can check out—all of them are completely free and require nothing more than your browser.
Quiet Forest: Animals appear if the room is quiet.
The game “Silent Forest” features a simple animated forest with a volume indicator. If you stay quiet for a bit, a cat will appear. If you stay quiet a bit longer, a bear will appear. Who else might join in? There’s only one way to find out. However, if you make too much noise, you’ll scare the animals, and then you’ll have to start all over again if you want to see everyone. The idea is for children to curiously observe which animals will appear next and remain silent—and, ideally, to silence each other.
Bouncing balls: Noise may interfere with the operation of the balls.
In Bouncy Balls, your screen fills with balls—you can choose from colorful balls, emojis, numbered balls, eyeballs, and even soap bubbles. The balls constantly vibrate, threatening to explode with a slight noise—which they do. There’s a risk of backfire—watching the balls bounce is actually quite fun—but you can mitigate this by enabling a sound alert or beep after any infraction.
Zen in the Classroom: Don’t Interrupt Ruby or Milo.
Classroom Zen offers several different tools for maintaining silence in the classroom. Two of them feature Ruby, a cartoon character meditating in the mountains or desert. If the room gets too noisy, her eyes will begin to open—keep it up, and she’ll ask everyone to be quiet. Another tool features Milo, a three-eyed monster trying to sleep.
The real secret here, however, is the timer at the top of the screen. This means you can tell your children they need to be quiet for a certain amount of time and use the timer to ensure they adhere to the rule.