Freerice: The World Food Programme’s English Vocabulary Game That Helps Feed the Hungry
We’ve all heard of the United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP), the leading humanitarian organization fighting hunger worldwide, but have you heard of Freerice (https://beta.freerice.com/game)? Freerice.com is an online English vocabulary game that helps feed the hungry through the WFP.
The simple but clever game was created in 2007. Players are asked to match the synonym of a word from 4 choices. If you find the correct meaning, 10 grains of rice are donated to countries where WFP is working. The rice is provided by WFP and donated by sponsors/advertisers. When players answer a question correctly, a sponsor message is shown below the correct answer. This sponsored message supports Freerice and triggers a financial payment used by WFP to buy the rice.
So by playing, you might learn new words and enhance your English vocabulary, but most importantly you generate the funds that provide rice for the hungry. You can play Freerice anonymously, or create an individual or group account to track your donations. Freerice has 600,000 users per month and has generated 202 billion grains of rice since going live.
Freerice questions vary in difficulty and the game automatically adjusts to the player’s level. The program keeps track of right or wrong questions, and then adjusts each question's difficulty level accordingly. There are 60 levels of vocabulary with over 12,000 words in all. The definitions for English vocabulary come from a wide variety of sources including dictionaries, thesauruses and books of synonyms. Each definition is double-checked and edited for accuracy.
Did you know?
Last year the Freerice game contributed to food programs in places like Yemen, Mozambique and South Sudan. In South Sudan alone, Freerice participated in feeding 275,000 children their daily school meals. Freerice is a huge contributor to WFP’s #zerohunger program.
Here at The English Quiz, we are interested in not only promoting the English language but giving back to those in need. We’re pleased to link to Freerice from our website and encourage as many people as possible to play the game. Support Freerice by playing here, or by downloading their new Android app on Google Play or on social media through Facebook or Instagram.