How can we reinvent learning to captivate the digital generations while meeting their specific needs? This is the challenge accepted by the creator of Brain Racers, an innovative platform that combines gamification, engagement, and personalised learning. In this interview, he shares his journey, inspirations, and vision for transforming education into a stimulating playground, making 21st century skills accessible to all. Let's get into this fascinating conversation with an entrepreneur who is determined to transform the foundations of learning.
What inspired you to create Brain Racers, and what was your vision when you launched this gamified learning tool?
I have enjoyed creating games since I was a child. I had a small game show that I hosted for 3 years, and I built 17 games during that time. All brain games around Math, logic, language etc.
My mum has been a teacher for 20+ years, teaching K-8 across 4 different countries. She has a unique insight into how early age education works across the world. What we realized early on is that education is the system on top, but underneath that the core is learning. And learning has to be fun - gamified, rewarding, and engaging!
So we decided to build the next generation of education, and we co-founded Brain Racers.
How does Brain Racers meet the specific educational needs of Gen Z and Gen Alpha?
We want to provide any child in the world with a strong foundation, starting with Math and English for Grades 3 to 7. We cater to late Gen Z and Gen Alpha right now, but the goal is for all future generations to have an equal opportunity to learn and build a strong foundation.
Latest data shows that 50 percent of kids are behind grade level expectations, by 1 to 3 years. That's a staggering number. We have shown over 3X acceleration in catching up on learning loss, and this is necessary for kids to get up to par.
Also, an important underlooked aspect is that kids want to be engaged. They are digital natives and old school teaching methods don’t work. The system today forces education. Our objective is to build more authentic experiences where students are genuinely interested and inspired to have a strong academic foundation.
This is why esports is a big part of our vision. We saw a gap in society where we don’t celebrate academic champions like we do sports athletes or entertainers in the world. This makes sense, sports have evolved over 100 years to build mega entertainment entities that turn neighborhood athletes into superstars. Superstars like Michael Jordan or Serena Williams who inspire millions of kids to follow their footsteps. This is now happening in the world of Youtube and Tiktok, and also in gaming and esports.
We will bring the same energy and excitement into brain sports and academics, spawning the Usain Bolt of Brain Racers, who will inspire billions of people.
How does Brain Racers contribute to the development of 21st century skills in young users?
21st century skills are extremely important, maybe more so now because we have AI tools to do everything for us. We focus on some of these skills and will continue enhancing our suite:
- Cognitive skills like pattern recognition and attention to detail are blended into our content with over 5,000 challenges and growing.
- Resilience is required to consistently improve in Brain Racers. We need to bring more emphasis to this factor, including a potential resilience meter.
- AI education is essential for the future and we have an AI education journey to provide students with that foundation.
- Growth mindset is blended across our experience, with pop ups and motivation screens to instill that in kids.
How can teachers and educators integrate Brain Racers into their own teaching practices?
All our content is tied to curriculum standards, and teachers can simply use the topic and grade level filters to choose what content they want to cover. This is perfect for reinforcement practice, through daily warm ups or brain breaks or individual assignments.
The students can play in private rooms (more fun in groups), or they can practice asynchronously and proceed at their own pace. Teachers also can look at student dashboards to see where they are struggling the most, and optimize where they spend their time with the students. We have developing new teacher focused reports, to make their life even easier, with AI recommendations on activities they can do with their students.
Have you seen any measurable impact thanks to Brain Racers?
We have run 9 efficacy studies, and our platform showed over 60 percent improvement in student performance in ~2 months. Some of the students improved by 200 to 300 percent on the topics they practiced consistently.
What kind of feedback have you received from users and educators so far?
85 percent of students surveyed said they loved Brain Racers. Our new bonus games have received feedback like: “this helped reduce my Math anxiety”. Teachers are able to save about 15 percent of their weekly time from class prep and grading by using Brain Racers effectively.
We built our platform through conversations and feedback sessions with over 400 teachers, and we continue to evolve with educators and parents.
How do parents perceive Brain Racers?
Parents love their kids spending productive time on the screen instead of whatever else the kids may have been doing. Parents want their kids to have higher test scores, that's the society we live in, and our efficacy data is very strong for them to get their kids using Brain Racers.
We just got a parent focused report ready as well, as the second most important thing to parents is clarity into their child’s abilities and progress.
What do you see as the challenges and opportunities for gamified learning in the years to come?
Everything will be gamified, if it isn’t already.
The challenge is, when everything is gamified, it may dilute the value of those rewards. Personalized gamification with AI will be the next frontier. This will open new doors to engagement tactics that are aligned with a user’s persona.
One issue is over stimulation, because of the different rewards and animations that platforms offer today. The users may not notice but it can train our brains to chase the reward more than the actual educational value underneath. The intrinsic value is essential and we need to be mindful of that.
What values guide you in your daily vision?
- Resilience and grit with intention, will trump skill and knowledge.
- Continuous learning and growth every day, we enjoy the process.
- Clear vision, shared repeatedly, helps the team perform at a higher level.
- Everybody is human so be patient and kind.
What advice would you give to young entrepreneurs looking to innovate in education?
Understand what is the latest norm in education. The products that were successful over the last 20 years will be different from the next 20.
Work closely with users and customers, and do your best to not be blinded by your own biases when the data is telling you something.
Unless you truly truly believe you got a better vision than the iterative feedback you’re receiving. Then go all in and improve the status quo by 10X.
Focusing on a smaller scope of a problem is the best way to derisk at the early stage.
There are no failures, only lessons, don’t quit!
This interview was conducted between Gianender Khanna and the EduTools editorial team
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