Whyville is a free, educational, virtual world geared toward children and preteens. Its goal is to engage its users in learning about a broad range of topics, from science and business to art and geography. The activities range in depth from basic to very involved, so it is good for a variety of ages and skill levels. The game is reported to be one of the most popular educational virtual worlds with a player base of more than 7 million. Like sites such as Webkinz and ClubPenguin, it involves playing games and exploring the virtual world to earn virtual money (in this case, "clams") for use in building an avatar.

Whyville has received a number of awards from independent parent groups for its educational value and safety. For example, Whyville has received awards in 2006, 2007, and 2008 from iParenting as the best website for kids, and the best on the web for its safety features. In 2008 Whyville received a NAPPA (National Parenting Publication Award) Gold Award as a site that represented the best in its genre for kids. 

Signing up

 Signing up for Whyville is easy. In your internet browser, type in http://www.whyville.net. Once at the page, create your avatar and click "done." You can then choose to "join now!" for a free account and full access to the site, or "enter as a guest" for limited chat and features. When you register for Whyville as a teacher, you can fill out a verification form and then register your students within your "Whyville class." Once inside Whyville, the website has many built-in prompts and tutorials to help you learn to navigate the virtual world. 

Safety

Chat among new members is restricted to prewritten phrases, but those who pass a "chat license test" (to show they understand online safety and what information is not allowed to be shared over Whyville) have more freedom to type personal messages to friends. Certain words are blacklisted, and there is a place in the settings to add "words I don't want to hear" and "words I don't want to say." The students must print off a permission slip to have their parents send in for permission to chat freely. 

After a student creates a Whyville account, they are asked to provide their parents' email address. This is simply to notify their parent that the child has accessed Whyville. The students could also use the teacher's email address if parents do not have email addresses. 

As a teacher using Whyville, it is important to have permission from the parents before signing your students up for Whyville (as with any internet service). In addition, you can print off each of your students' official Whyville permission slips from their Whyville accounts IF you need access to chat for your lesson. These need to be returned by the parents and then sent into Whyville inc. so that the children can chat freely within your classroom space in Whyville. It is important to start this process early in the year to ensure that your students will have access to Whyville long before the unit. Most activities in Whyville do not require chat, so lack of a parental permission slip would not exclude any students from participating

Educational Uses

Whyville has lots of different areas students can "visit" to discover science in the classroom. For example, students can visit the "Whyville BioPlex" which includes the BioPlex Lobby where you can develop viruses and vaccines. You can also enter into the "Climate Center" to learn about global warming and increasing CO2 levels. The "C.A.R.E Lobby" is a center where you create habitats for animals and learn what they need and how to care for them. In the Food Court you can learn about nutrition through fun games. At the WhOI Dock you can learn about plankton and hydrothermal vents. You can track the motion of the sun in the Tiki Hut. Take the ferry to Raven Island and learn about trash pick up and it's collaborative nature. Visit the Reef Station where you can learn about food chains, classification, and the kinds of animals found in reefs.

You can also use Whyville to explore other subjects such as art and economics (for instance, the "clams" system of earning and spending money on different things like power plants and cars).

Sample Lesson

The screenshots below demonstrate a lesson you can use for your class in Whyville at the Reef Station. It is suited for a 1st grade classroom and supports standard 2.2: An organism is a living thing that has physical characteristics to help it survive. 

Students need to login to Whyville (or enter as a guest, if this is a one-time lesson) and use the map to navigate to the Reef Station. Here they can pick up their SCUBA gear and go to either the North or South Reef and begin exploring. 

Here, students are SCUBAing on the reef and clicking animals and other creatures that they want to learn about. A maximum of five can be chosen at a time. As students click, the organism they have chosen is recorded for them in their "WhyReef Journal." After five unknown species have been selected, students are directed to navigate to the journal where they will go through some prompts to classify the specimen. Then there is a page similar to the one below where students can read about that animal's various needs and preferences for its habitat. After the organism has been identified, a count will be kept of how many times the student spots that particular species on the reef.  

In first grade, this lesson could support a discussion on the similarities and differences between the animals on the reef and also between the reef creatures and other animals that students know about. This would help create a well-rounded understanding of classification and different needs of animals tied to physical characteristics. 

If a more formal assessment is needed to show student understanding, the teacher could hand out simple worksheets where students could record organisms that they found based on classification (fish, plant, invertebrate, mammal, reptile) and include certain interesting facts about them to show they read the "encyclopedia" page about each animal. 

Resources

Articles about WhyVille including general information about the site and ideas for lesson topics:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whyville

http://www.parenting.com/article/Child/Development/Social-Networking-Sites-for-Kids/2

http://www.whyville.net/press/latimes_020708.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/anastasia-goodstein/virtual-environmentalism_b_54025.html

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2003576142_ptgett17.html

http://www.clickz.com/clickz/news/1697464/scion-offers-virtual-car-loans-whyville

Study comparing Whyville to another virtual education world: 

http://www.cathleengalas.com/papers/4TotallyDifferentWorldDIGRA05.pdf