We are excited to announce the release of our next game – Motion Math: Wings! Click here to download the app and use the accelerometer to control a flying bird who travels across diverse islands, building a nest and winning colorful feathers. Along the way, the bird solves multiplication problems. Most math worksheets and math games only show numeric symbols, such as 2 x 3 = 6. Motion Math: Wings shows multiplication in six different visual forms: rows of dots, clusters of dots, “groups of” dots, a grid, a labelled grid, and symbols (2 x 3).

Fun flight animations and sound effects help learners master foundational concepts of multiplication and estimation. As with our last game, hints appear when you need them. Challenge comes in the form of Challenge Islands, where you have to get each problem right to pass, as well as levels difficult enough for adults.

Thanks to all the kids, teachers and parents who helped us design this game. During the development of the game, we visited classrooms and the Children’s Creativity Museum to gather feedback from the experts: kids. We greatly appreciate the teachers and students at the elementary schools who volunteered to user test and offer valuable feedback – Kerri Willa, Jenny Howland, Kim Davis, Ken Wong, Jill Slagter, Ben Grossman-Kahn and students at Chinese American International, Stocklmeir Elementary, De Vargas Elementary and Katherine Burke School.

As always, we appreciate your thoughtful reviews on the App Store and the comments, suggestions, and feedback you send to us. Any questions on this new math game? Leave us a comment below!

We recently visited Joan Young’s Grade 4 classroom at Trinity School. She later wrote that her class “had a wonderful time with the Motion Math team. Students tested out the app Hungry Fish before it was complete and had the opportunity to give input about next levels. All of my students really enjoyed the experience and were inspired about becoming innovators in the future.”

Interested? Please email us at info@motionmathgames.com and we’ll find a convenient time.

• Students who played the game for 20 minutes for five days improved on a fractions test by an average of 15%. (The items on the test were taken from national and international standardized tests.)
• Students’ attitudes towards fractions improved 10%.
• Virtually all students rated the game as fun and that it helped them learn.

This is a very encouraging result that our engaged approach to math works. Read the full report, which includes an overview of how difficult it is for students to learn fractions, a description of the study’s rigorous design, some critiques of our game’s design, and recommendations for learning app producers and researchers.

What do you think is the best design and assessment of children’s apps? What do you think about the study? (please comment below) A few early reviewers have suggested to us that this study is overkill. Well, certainly not every kid’s app can afford the time and money it takes for a formal assessment. When designing an app, there are hundreds of design decisions to make, and certainly most of them can’t be guided by rigorous experimental data. A designer can follow his or her intuition, or listen to experts, or read about elements of good design, or read the learning literature, or, hopefully, do lots of user-testing to watch and see if students seem to be learning.

However, the history of educational technology is littered with many false promises and disappointing results, most recently given an overview by the NYT’s Matt Richtel. It’s easy to think, as you’re creating a learning game and as you watch a student use technology, that learning is happening. So it’s important that we sometimes hold our products up to scientific scrutiny.

We’re hoping this study raises the bar for learning apps, and encourages more studies, so that when parents and teachers buy our products, they can be confident they are getting a product that actually helps children learn. Read the study here! And then please comment below: What should the standards of evidence be for learning apps? How do you know if a learning app works?

We’re looking for a smart engineer with experience in iOS, games, and/or graphics. More details here. Introduce away! careers@motionmathgames.com

Thanks to all the kids and teachers that helped us design this game. During the development of the game, we visited a classroom a week to gather feedback from the experts: kids in elementary schools around the Bay Area. We appreciate the teachers and students at Meyerholtz, Prospect-Sierra, San Jose Discovery, Vallecito, Fammatre, John Muir, Westlake, Piedmont, and Dublin Elementary Schools. Find more specific thanks in the About screen of the app.

As always, we really appreciate your thoughtful reviews on the App Store and the comments, suggestions, and feedback you send to us. Any questions on the new game?

• A study from Carnegie Mellon University found that “the more linear a child’s number line, the better the child was at remembering numbers,” both for preschool and elementary school children. (The mental number line seems to originate on the logarithmic scale and only with training become more linear!)

• A recent study from Johns Hopkins University, covered in the NYT, showed that children who were better at estimation were also better at simple math problems. This was true in children as young as three – children without formal training.

• Lastly, a five-year-long study at the University of Missouri which concluded this summer correlated first graders’ number sense and basic arithmetic skills with their math achievement as fifth graders. (One of the key metrics was how the child estimated values on the number line.) The study suggests that early gains in number sense could have a big impact on a child’s math achievement.

We’re currently conducting our own formal study of our first game, in conjunction with Professor Michelle Riconscente of USC. We’re excited to soon report our own findings.

Please contact us if you’re interested or know someone who might be: info@motionmathgames.com