Blogcritics The critical lens on today's culture & entertainment
This week the award-winning online game FreeRice added a new subject: world hunger. Players can now answer questions about hunger and malnutrition while helping collect donations of rice.
When you play FreeRice you answer questions in a variety of subjects including vocabulary, math, science and art. There is even an SAT preparation section. For each correct answer ten grains of rice are donated to the UN World Food Programme (WFP), paid for by advertisers on the site.
WFP is the world’s largest food aid organization and relies on donations to fight hunger in many countries around the globe.
When you answer questions correctly while playing FreeRice a bowl fills up with rice, which will be sent to hungry people around the world. (photo from author’s collection)
Dr. Al Forsyth, who wrote most of the questions for the world hunger subject, says: “It’s always fun to see how smart you are, to show off your knowledge playing Freerice while contributing to a most worthy cause. But if the subject is really important, as world hunger surely is, how much better to also learn from playing the game. Playing “World Hunger” will help you understand why it is so important to fill that bowl with rice!”
With the school year starting up, teachers around the country have an extremely valuable tool to use in Freerice. Students can learn while tackling the toughest crisis facing the globe. Schools can even compete to see who answers the most questions correctly and donates the most rice.
I had the chance to write some of the questions for the world hunger subject, mainly about the history. If you read my article in the Des Moines Register titled Humanitarian Heroes, Both Large and Invisible and also my piece on the Russian Famine of 1921, you will be prepared for some of those questions. You can continue a great humanitarian tradition of fighting hunger by playing FreeRice.
You can start playing the World Hunger subject at Freerice.com.
