Monk-e mail

Today was one of those rare days in the technology realm when everything works perfectly according to plan. As part of a unit on "The 6 Most Important Decisions You'll Ever Make," students were to explore Sean Covey's website. I was going to have them read the author's short bio and then be ready to share something they learned about him. However, as I was perusing the website I noticed a link to "cool links." There I found Monk-e mail- a hilarious site that allows you to compose an email with special effects. For example, you get to dress your monkey and choose the setting. Best of all, you can write whatever you want the monkey to say and he'll deliver your personal voice message in an e-mail. So, I created one first and had the students listen to it. It gave them instructions to compose their own monk-e mail with something they learned about the author. After creating their own, they were to send it to my e-mail. I was able to assess whether they read the bio and learned anything about the author. It was one of the most enjoyable assessments ever! And it was obvious how much fun they had with an assignment that would have normally been ho-hum.