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Oct. 29th, 2007 12:28 pmVocabulary quiz: Free Rice
This vocabulary test is really great? Freerice, unlike a traditional vocab test, has a large dictionary and measures hardness of words by how many people get them right this means it's amazingly good at finding words right on the boundary of what you know, ones you've heard used somewhere, but can't quite place, rather than either being words anyone knows, or common long words, or words so obscure only people in specialist fields know them, or words simply famous for being obscure.
This gives an unfair advantage in the quiz to people who know words from having heard them used in books and conversations with articulate people, rather than people who read dictionaries for fun :) So it suits me.
The questions are tailored to your responses, after a few minutes finding their own level at a category of words you know 3/4 of. I could play all day.
Also, it (apparently) raises advertising revue, from which it donates to charity.
This morning, I got up to level 45/50 before starting getting them wrong. What do you get?
Geography quiz: Statetris
There've been many geography quizes going round that ask if you can place countries in europe, but this is so cool because it's Tetris!
Each country falls from the north, and you have to manoeuvre it into position. There's some clues, for instance, it has to be one of the ones on the bottom.
In the easy level the country is labelled. In intermediate, it isn't. In hard, it needs to be rotated to the correct orientation.
It's really satisfying because when you've completed all-but-one, the last country is Russia, which is really big, and really obvious, so it's such a release to be able to plonk it down with a thunderous crash to finish the level.
This vocabulary test is really great? Freerice, unlike a traditional vocab test, has a large dictionary and measures hardness of words by how many people get them right this means it's amazingly good at finding words right on the boundary of what you know, ones you've heard used somewhere, but can't quite place, rather than either being words anyone knows, or common long words, or words so obscure only people in specialist fields know them, or words simply famous for being obscure.
This gives an unfair advantage in the quiz to people who know words from having heard them used in books and conversations with articulate people, rather than people who read dictionaries for fun :) So it suits me.
The questions are tailored to your responses, after a few minutes finding their own level at a category of words you know 3/4 of. I could play all day.
Also, it (apparently) raises advertising revue, from which it donates to charity.
This morning, I got up to level 45/50 before starting getting them wrong. What do you get?
Geography quiz: Statetris
There've been many geography quizes going round that ask if you can place countries in europe, but this is so cool because it's Tetris!
Each country falls from the north, and you have to manoeuvre it into position. There's some clues, for instance, it has to be one of the ones on the bottom.
In the easy level the country is labelled. In intermediate, it isn't. In hard, it needs to be rotated to the correct orientation.
It's really satisfying because when you've completed all-but-one, the last country is Russia, which is really big, and really obvious, so it's such a release to be able to plonk it down with a thunderous crash to finish the level.