Web Is Totally Decked for Winter Holidays

No matter what December holiday is celebrated, there are plenty of festive Web sites for children and their parents to enjoy. Holidays on the Net, Goldie’s Winter Wonderland and Torah Tots each offer their own blend of good tidings for all.

Holidays on the Net

https://www.holidays.net

Many Web sites observe only one holiday. Not so with Holidays on the Net. Here, everything from Martin Luther King Jr. Day to Mardi Gras to Easter to Halloween is represented for children and their parents to enjoy. With the holiday spirit in full swing, users can explore Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and Ramadan on Holidays on the Net, plus access a vast inventory of related pages.

Holidays on the Net is designed for easy navigation and features holiday lists and descriptions plus a special search component with three ways to view holiday information. These include a site search, a special holiday Web listing of sites and links that have been reviewed before inclusion as well as a holiday search engine for the entire Web.

Kids and parents also can enjoy a variety of seasonal crafts such as designing Christmas birdhouse ornaments and recipes for such goodies as Hanukkah cookies. Free holiday e-greetings and a well-stocked holiday store are available as well.

Goldie’s Winter Wonderland

https://www.goldenbooks.com/holiday

What child doesn’t love Rudolph, “the most famous reindeer of all?” Now kids can join their red-nosed favorite at Goldie’s Winter Wonderland for an interactive Christmas fest courtesy of Golden Books. Even better, they will have a chance to help other children through a special holiday promotion with the Marine Toys for Tots foundation.

At Goldie’s Winter Wonderland, kids can follow read-along stories, send e-cards, enjoy a Rudolph sing-along and view video clips from the classic animated Rudolph television special. There are also simple yuletide games to play such as Elf-Maze and Let It Snow Globe, a neat way to build your own virtual snowflake globe.

The best part of this very warm and charming site, however, is its charity component. No purchase is necessary to participate. All kids have to do is explore the site and play the games, and they will accrue virtual presents. These presents will then be deposited in the Toys for Tots truck--which is beautifully animated on screen--and Golden Books will make an actual donation to the fund. This promotion, along with the holiday site, runs through Jan. 7.

Torah Tots

https://www.torahtots.com

Bringing Jewish traditions to life for children is the mission behind Torah Tots, and that’s precisely what the site accomplishes, especially in the holiday section. All the basic Jewish holidays are well represented in this brightly designed, kid-friendly site, and Hanukkah is no exception.

Tots can learn the story of the Festival of Lights, play an interactive round of “spin the dreidel,” print out black-and-white line drawings for coloring and enjoy games and puzzles. Word Find asks kids to locate Hanukkah words within a puzzle grid; Star Grid is a code-breaking exercise; Replace the Latke is a culinary quiz; and Plopples features a jumble of nonsensical words that, if spoken enough times, suggest seasonal phrases.

In addition to holidays, Torah Tots also includes Parsha, a weekly rundown of the Torah read in synagogue on the Sabbath, plus Learning Is Fun, where kids can explore the Hebrew alphabet and an ongoing series on prayers. There are also downloads of Jewish music, a Torah Tots printable monthly Jewish calendar, historical facts and events in Jewish history and a gift shop.

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Karen Jones is a freelance writer specializing in children’s interactive media.

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Kids’ Web Sites

Holidays on the Net

https://www.holidays.net

A holiday super-site

Goldie’s Winter Wonderland

https://www.goldenbooks.com/holiday

Lots of fun, with a purpose

Torah Tots

https://www.torahtots.com

Jewish traditions for kids