Vocabulary Activities: 5 Sites for Learning with Avatars

We’re always looking for engaging activities to use to practice words that our AAC friends are learning. For some learners, making avatars can be a great way to do have an authentic reason to use words for body parts and accessories as well as modifiers for size, shape, color, and other things. Plus…Who wouldn’t want an excuse to make a younger, thinner, cuter, or funnier version of themselves?! Here are some sites to check out.

1. Pop Art Pixies: Basic avatar site oriented for girls. Good for using core language, making requests, color & size words.
2. DoppelMe: Easy to use site  for making cartoon-like avatars with several opportunities to choose elements, like clothes, hairstyles, and backgrounds. Use words for feelings to select facial expressions.
3. WeeWorld: Another user-friendly site that can be a fun way to use descriptors in making selections to create, dress, and style your avatar. This site’s graphics would make it appealing to pre-teens and teens.
4. Bitstrips: Fun place to create avatars and then use them to make comic strips. This is a very prAACtical site for vocabulary practice in a fun context because there are many elements that you can choose from and adjust in making your avatars.
5. Voki: The most sophisticated and adult-like avatar site in the list, this has a feature worth checking out: the avatars talk! The avatars can be used on their own or in the fee-based Voki Classroom. Lots of opportunity for dialogue and vocabulary practice when making these realistic-looking avatars.

Hope you get to have some fun language experiences with these sites. We’d love to see your creations!!

For more on avatars, explore this glog by Susan Oxnevad.