Interactive app brings to life ancient tale

Submitted 8 years ago

Community Review for The Voyage of Ulysses

Lisa L.
Lisa L.
My Rating
Pedagogy
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My Take

This teaching tool is essential for those who struggle with teaching this complex text. Students often lose sight of the meaning of the prose, and this app boils down the text in digestible bites. I also appreciated the readability of the text for those students who are ELL, special needs or low literacy. It is interesting enough for even a fifth grader to comprehend the journey of Ulysses! The buttons on the bottom of the screen allow the user to "turn the page", or to retreat to another page of the story, or to access the index where the map of Ulysses journey is shown. Further, the question mark brings to life an element of the story that is not shown on the main screen. Students found the interactive portion to be of high interest - they were never sure what would be "active" and what new understanding would be revealed by touching parts of the screen. The drawings are replicas of those found in the original prose, and students would connect these with the actual text. They are not overly animated, or cartoonish which assists students with identifying the threats that Ulysses encounters. This was one of my favorite texts to teach to a 9th grade class, and this would have assisted my struggling readers or chronically absent students when we waded through this text.

How I Use It

This app "The Voyage of Ulysses" is very applicable to those who study the Odyssey in class. This interactive app brings to life the prose on the page. For a middle school or ninth grade text, it could be viewed as a supplement. Between the use of the touch screen, and the text readability, it was clearly user-friendly for all of my students, particularly the ELL population struggling to make sense of Homer's words. After reading each story, students could access this app in order to reinforce the basic understanding, and visually connect with the prose. For me, the "read to me" function didn't work on my ipad. This was unfortunate because I wanted to see how it would flow for the user who utilizes the touch screen often.

More community reviews for The Voyage of Ulysses

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Eric W.
Eric W. West Ottawa High School Campus Holland, MI
April 18, 2015

Fun, basic version of the story with interesting visuals and a pretty sound track.

This was a fun overview of The Odyssey. It begins with a brief history of the Trojan War, hits all of the major stops on Ulysses'/Odysseus' journey home, and concludes with Penelope testing her husband to make sure he is who he says he is. The graphics and sound are interested and well-conceived. One small complaint, sometimes the sound effects of the animations made it hard to hear the audio version of the text. Some of the animations made it hard to read the words, too. I'm surprised it offers a second language besides English. Maybe more surprised that this second language is Italian. The population in my school would benefit more if it offered a version in Spanish. I really liked the accessibility of the text. The language was clear without being too simple. The story was told in enough detail for struggling students to benefit. It was also nice that each screen told a key point from the story but also included a pull-up window with additional information with more detail or historical context. It's also nice that students can listen/read the story in order or navigate a map of the ancient map to choose a specific chapter. My kids liked the way the story was told, too.
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