I know this “The Best…” list has a strange title, but I couldn’t think of any other way to describe sites that let you write or speak commands and then have the figures on the screen follow them. They’re excellent — and fun– ways for English Language Learners to practice their English.

Here are my choices for The Best “When I Say Jump” Online Sites For Practicing English:

The most famous first example is Subservient Chicken, a marketing tool by Burger King in 2004 that is still active. You can direct a person in a detailed chicken costume at their site.

At I Do Dog Tricks you can do the same to a cute little dog.

I think the best and most ambitious site of this kind is Family Friendly Simon Sez Santa. Its supply of commands is much, much greater than the other two, and each year additional ones are added.

Minion Dominion is a brand new site designed to publicize an NBC TV show. It lets you command two weird-looking creatures to do things. It’s different from the other three I’ve mentioned since it lets you give voice commands through a microphone, as well as writing them.

The “Special Holiday Emergency Desk” is a wonderful application to reinforce vocabulary with English Language Learners, and it’s also a lot of fun for anybody else. You type in the word for just about anything, and a virtual artist “draws” it for you. It’s an almost seamless use of Google Image search that converts any image into a version that appears like it’s been drawn.

“A Hunter Shoots A Bear!” is a great interactive YouTube video where you direct the action:

Additional suggestions are welcome.

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