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These great sites have a host of games, facts, and activities for you and your kids to enjoy.

• Visit www.pbskids.org for interactive games involving your younger children’s favorite characters like the Cookie Monster and Barney. Be sure to check out the games from Reading Rainbow—you can draw your own hero and even play online Concentration.

• Check out www.scholastic.com/kids for elementary and middle school kids. Play Harry Potter trivia, mix your own tunes, decide what you’d do if you were president, and vote in kid polls.

• Make learning fun with games that test math, grammar, spelling, and myriad other subjects at www.funbrain.com. The site offers games appropriate from ages 6 and under to 17 and up. Conveniently organized into subject matter, you can also search for games or simply encourage intellectual curiosity by reading fun facts.

• Budding scientists and curious kids will enjoy the range of activities at www.discoverykids.com. Learn about great white sharks, watch live Siberian tigers via Web cam, and play “Make a Mummy.”

• Mini-Houdinis can click on the “Free Tricks” link on www.conjuror.com to learn magic tricks guaranteed to impress.

• To find jokes, send e-mail cards to pals, play games, and learn about all sorts of things, visit www.yahooligans.com.

• Stargazers can learn what to expect from the sky each month, see pictures of astronomy subjects, and even discover some of the secrets of the universe at www.dustbunny.com/afk.

Editor’s note: Technology impacts us all as working professionals—but it also affects us as citizens, community members, families, and individuals. Accordingly, this space in ITforUM will be devoted to a new topic each issue that addresses ways technology can be useful, fun, or interesting in our roles outside work. We hope you enjoy and we welcome your suggestions for column ideas at ITforUM@umd.edu.