Managing children’s progress is tiresome. It requires a considerable time and effort to track and analyse growth. In today’s times, early literacy matters, multiple educators and parents are seeking methods for more productive child experience.

In the quest for good school records, often parents and teachers neglect and ignore their children early educational needs. Scorning the child’s requirement will not help in any manner. Every child wants a special treatment or learning tool to support them. Using interactive early learning games promotes’ self-learning and motivates the kids’ to learn to read.

Square Panda’s Playground is a digital foundation for successful early literacy and language management. It has multisensory instructions, which triggers the young brains to process information; it gains deeper cognition and strengthens the little learner’s levels.

A blend of tactile letters combined with a multisensory experience uses different senses; enhances learning through play. It aids the curriculum milestones and goals in each of the classic legacy games. These mini-games adapt to the learner’s level and make them well-versed of phonological awareness, phonics, spelling, builds vocabulary and much more. Here the students achieve endless engagement, reiteration and exposure to early literacy.

Square Panda has a backbone of a deep neuroscience-based researched approach. The Teachers and Parents’ Evaluation Portal is an innovative and adaptive platform syncronised with current learning levels. Learn how to turn your average learners into smarter thinkers using Square Panda Games. Discover the ‘Playground’ and bring forward the key to successful learning.

AMAZING THINGS YOU’LL FIND IN THE SQUARE PANDA PLAYGROUND:

• • Teachers can explore the players i.e. students, customise their account, add more players, discover the badges and suggest words.
  • Square Panda’s Word Bank gives an opportunity to expand children’s vocabulary.
  • The average volume of the words in the bank:
    -Real word dictionary: 58k+ real words.
    -Phonemic dictionary: 85k+ real/nonsense or silly words pronunciations.
  • Teaching aids like flashcards, storybooks and workbooks will quicken the learning process.
  • Give them access to our open-ended exploratory play.
  • Add customise words and pictures into a child’s personalised, and private database.
  • New Classroom playset comes with a built-in ‘QR Code’, which allows quick scan.
  • Badges: Easily track the children’s accomplishments across each Square Panda’s game level and watch the badges fill with color as they enter words in different milestones.
    • Big Badges: It consists of detailed progress mapping for each curriculum milestone.
    • Mini Badges: The child earns mini badges when they spell- name, numbers and words correctly.
  • View words list and letter history. Discover every word your students have spelt the most across Square Panda learning games.
  • The word list consists of:
    • Real words played
    • Nonsense words played
    • Letters that the child played
    • Letter orientation
    • Letter mixups and areas of confusion
  • Use easy-to-read reports to track and trace students’ milestones progress.
  • Administrators can check their students time spent, the fidelity of implementation and give a real-time assessment in the form of feedback.
  • Lost Letter: Missing a few letters? Simply report them here, and the games will react intelligently, so the children can continue to learn to play.
  • Access the NewsFeed: It helps to stay plugged to all the latest updates in early education and literacy.

LISTEN TO SQUARE PANDA’S CO-FOUNDER- ANDY BUTLER AS HE UNCOVERS THE SECRETS OF OUR ‘PORTAL’.

GIVE THEM POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT:

Square Panda has a distinct administrators’ portal where they can control over the deployment within the classroom. Educators can measure their students progress with a multivariable grid of phonics skills. The reports provide a window into the students progress. It helps in boosting a positive screen time with educational elements.

HERE ARE SOME QUICK STEPS TO LOGIN THE PORTAL:

THE PARENTS PORTAL VIDEO:

THE TEACHERS PORTAL VIDEO:

Parents and Teachers can take full charge of the playground via a portal. Using their login id and password they can access every element to make early learning fun. The playground has coupled language learning with a sequence program to nurture and polish the children skills. Learning through play gives children the ability to experience the best of both worlds.

Now convert your kids’ reading time into fun time with Square Panda’s Playset and keep unproductivity at bay.

Want to become a Square Panda-Powered School? Connect with us via LinkedIn.

–Nidhi Parikh, SEO Content Writer, Square Panda India

You know how there is a manual inside every device and product you own/purchase? The one that is extremely important and holds the guide to using said device or product properly? We decided our Square Panda users needed one user guide of their very own, to guide them along their journey to early education and literacy.

We recommend every first-time user read our cheat sheet of instructions, before using our playset and Smart Letters.

Firstly, let us explain the terms we use while referring to the Square Panda phonics playset:

Your guide to using the Square Panda Playset:

Your guide to using the Square Panda Smart Letters:

Why Coloured Letters?

According to a study conducted in 2002, learners performed much better when they were introduced to ‘realistic’ coloured objects, rather than simple black-and-white or even random coloured objects.

Young learners use colour and shape to identify things and describe them. It offers learners a sense of security and stimulation when they are taught using one or two colours. A riot of them, however, seems to make beginner learners anxious and overstimulated.

Yellow (in small amounts) is a happy colour, and boosts growth and development. It can also help stimulate the memory and improve concentration.

The combination of blue and red, purple takes on both their qualities, soothing and calming like blue, and attracting attention, energising the mind, and increasing athletic ability like red.

Caring For Your Playset, Smart Letters:

• Like any other electronic device, taking our playset and the letters for a swim is not the best idea! We did design them to be durable, but if they get wet, dry them off with a cloth as soon as possible.
  Letters not reading correctly? They may have something stuck to their bottom side. Clean the letters with a damp cloth and then dry them thoroughly. Make sure to keep the letter slots of the tray just as clean, as small bits of food or other debris can affect the reading of the letters. If your letters are still giving you a problem, contact us, and we’ll do our best to solve your problem.
  Remember, the settings button uses a ‘long press’ function. We thought that might be enough to fool kids, and prevent them from accessing the settings page. We applied the same reasoning to the ‘adults only’ menu, asking for a code which is entirely in words. The assumption was that if your kids can read those, then they are probably ready for more advanced learning tools.

Come back next week for an in-depth look at our incredible progress monitoring tools for kids…

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India

Boredom teaches everyone that life isn’t a themed amusement park. Even young brains get easily stuck in the whirlpool of boredom, and it fills the teachers and parents’ mind with a cascade of guilt and accountability. The problem with the current education scenario is that it has somewhat submerged under the heavy load of papers with no fun elements. Learning should have a high ratio of fun quotient.

Children’s brains can easily drift into an elaborate fantasy realm which captures their attention. But, there’s a hope to channel learning equation for kids, all thanks to a new breed of early educational games apps. These apps are popularly known as ‘gamification’ in which educational and game elements are added together to generate a child’s productivity level. Gamification is the new trend in recent times, and multiple brain games for kids have changed the learning environment.

NOW EXACTLY WHAT IS GAMIFICATION?

Understand Gamification And Game-Based Learning.

For starters, gamification of learning is an educational approach which is inspiring students’ to learn using the elements of the game.  A young brain gets motivated using the lessons blended with gaming elements. This makes education more fun-filled. Often, gamification and game-based learning are used interchangeably, but it does not mean they are similar.
In the gamifying standard psychological tasks, the research has highlighted game elements can improve the task accessibility, build engagement using a system, and inspiring long-term participation. Yes, gamification is already spreading its roots in a variety of settings; there are game-based early educational platforms, multisensory systems for early learners, and as they level-up chances of winning increases. A slew of research studies have verified the connection between improvement in the engagement and better learning experience to kids. The core idea is to boost the child’s productivity using the concepts of gamified and game-based learning platform.

The gaming elements in game-based learning:

Gaming Elements In Learning

BLOOM OF GAMIFICATION IN EDUCATION

Nick Pelling (a British computer programmer, and entrepreneur) coined the word ‘gamification’ in 2002. He stated, gamification as ‘applying game-like accelerated user interface design to make electronic transactions both enjoyable and fast.’ Thus, games started to begin developed as a learning machine. Now, the gamification concept is implemented in the cultures of education, and it provides maximum value to the students.

HOW DO CLASSROOMS TAKE ADVANTAGES OF GAMIFYING EDUCATION?

The biggest challenge for the teachers is to gain their student’s interest to interact and engage them. For doing so, the teacher’s needs to redefine the course materials or the teaching techniques which will fuel efficient learners. Gamification would chalk out the right direction to encourage students by easily involving them in the classroom activities and learn well.

GAMIFY TO IMPROVE GRADES

Games are gradually turning into verified educative tools which delivers the best to raise the kid’s interest. Following a standard set of the curriculum will improve the transformation of involving preschoolers. Gamification reinforces the context which will profoundly impact classroom management. Students will develop an interest to attend regular classes. The educational games will keep the class actively hooked, engage preschoolers cognitively, emotionally and socially.

For example: If we develop a game that transforms the base of education by adding rewards or bonus points for every correct answer, then children will gain more interest to participate in each of the activities conducted.

Teachers needs to integrate educational games into the curriculum to enhance the involvement of the students. Grades will be surely rising. Moreover, a gamified classroom is a dynamic approach to teach kids.

If you want to know, how to boost a child’s productivity; here’s the lay low of how teachers can seamlessly use the gamification in early education to increase a child’s productivity level.

– GAMIFY TO RAISE ENTHUSIASM: Gamification brings in the fun element in learning any subject, even the uninspired or struggling children can be motivated to reach the next level. Early learners enjoy themselves to participate in games and without realising the fact that they are actually practicing learning. These kids begin to focus on improving schoolwork and improving skills in the class.

– Square Panda’s multisensory learning games, like Letter Lab, Lagoon, Bowling, and Space Cows, inspires kids to explore their potential while they learn to read.

– AIDS COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT: Numerous studies have reflected that cognitive development turns young brains into more profound learners. Neuroscience theorists believe adding gamified teaching content will stimulate cognitive skills. These skills will help to solve problems, perform strategic planning, thinking and processing the material.

It will produce a stimulating environment for the brain to find answers to questions. Gamification will create a positive effect on their cognitive functions, and achieve autonomy.

– GAMIFICATION GENERATES TEAMWORK: Preschoolers will learn to collaborate with their classmates by working together as a team. They are constantly learning something new.

-GAMIFICATION INCREASES ATTENTION SPAN: It is the cold truth: a game will capture students’ attention more than anything else. Games offers unique experiences to the participants. They will like to spend more time learning.

WHAT DOES GAMIFICATION BRING TO EDUCATION?

Let’s listen to our experts’ advice.

KNOW THE SQUARE PANDA WAY OF LEARNING

The future of learning is in the child’s early development. Kill their boredom with curiosity and advance their interest in fun learning games!

Square Panda’s neuroscience research-based multisensory learning platform to absorb the elements of phonemes, phonological awareness, vocabulary, rhymes, etc. Each lesson guides early learners with personalised gameplay.

If you are searching for the best practices for gamifying the delivery of education, then drop down your comments and we’ll help you attain your goals.

Learn how to teach your kids the multisensory way, watch the video here.

You can also connect with us on Facebook and Linkedin for more information.

–Nidhi Parikh, SEO Content Writer, Square Panda India

‘Screen Time’, or the time spent by a person in front of a screen, is growing by leaps and bounds every day.

Photo by Vidmir Raic from Pixabay

Guidelines issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend no digital exposure until children are 18 months of age, and exposure with adult engagement at least until they are 5 years old. We at Square Panda follow their instructions, endorsing the use of our literacy platform for children above 2 years of age. We are also great believers of learning via screen time, for the following reasons:

WE LIVE IN A DIGITAL WORLD

Digital media has invaded every part of our lives, in offices, homes, and even schools. In such a scenario, ensuring children are digitally literate is not just smart, it is also staying a step ahead of the times. Supervised screen time, can, if handled correctly, can increase children’s confidence and prepare them for their future.

PUTTING THE ‘SELF’ IN ‘SELF-CONTROL’

An overuse of anything, be it screens or even play time, is never a good thing. With that said, parents and teachers should try to encourage children to self-regulate the time they spend in front of a device. Teaching them moderation through methods like fear (you can scare them away from too much screen time by showing them its adverse effects), and positive motivation (entice them away from the device by introducing them to something they enjoy more), can have unexpected benefits. Because they are setting their own (moderate) time in front of a device, they become more independent, confident, and self-assured. They are gradually able to identify their own needs and wants, and figure out a way to meet them.

THE HEALTH BENEFITS OF SCREEN TIME

Research has proven that screen time can actually help, rather than hinder, development of young children. Screen time has also received a ‘thumbs-up’ from child media expert and Vice President of PBS KIDS Digital, Sara DeWitt, who believes screen time can be beneficial if used correctly.

• In light of fear that excess screen time can cause obesity, look to videos, apps, and activities that encourage children to move rather than stare passively at the screen. Square Panda’s games, like Jiggity Jamble and Monster Rhymes, motivate kids to use their bodies while learning English.
  Talking to kids about their pastimes, and more specifically, their favoured games, has a way of opening up the conversation to new avenues. Experts even suggest this can lead to enhanced social and emotional interactions.
  Parents and teachers can control the content, choosing only those programs/products that have a high quality of educational age-appropriate content. And there are a lot of high-quality educational products out there!

SCREEN TIME WITH A DIFFERENCE

For more such images, check out our Instagram and Facebook pages.

We ask parents and teachers across India to say a big, resounding ‘YES’ to screen time with us, because our early literacy system has 40% less screen time with our multisensory approach; kids constantly look away from the screen to search for and pick up Smart Letters while playing with games. Unlike other digital experiences, Square Panda’s phonics-based early education platform qualifies—and many parents would agree with us here—as ‘good Screen Time’. With a product that is research-based (we’ve got our own team of experts in the field of early education, working alongside educators) and has proven results in many schools and homes across America and China, Square Panda’s vast library of educational games makes a child’s time in front of a device more productive.

For more such images, visit our Instagram and Facebook pages.

We think an introduction to the digital world is essential in today’s day and age, but we highly recommend a balanced use of screen time, with children going outdoors as regularly as they learn and play indoors.

What Do You Think:

Take this poll and let us know your thoughts about ‘Screen Time’ in your homes and classrooms:

https://discover.apester.com/media/5c8b35eef115e0e2aae10a1f?src=link

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India

Ever imagined the preschoolers surpassing all the milestones and reaching their ultimate potential? Young brains requires milestones to develop their base foundation skills. 
Teachers, Parents, and Caregivers, always wonder about how to encourage the child by directing them in the right path. Now you can trigger the accurate emotions, set them on course for effective and engaging learning. Evolve their cognition’s easily.

“Cognitive Development pertains improving the skills in terms of understanding the concepts, perception, learning, thinking and processing information in the brain.”

In simpler terms, Cognition refers to thinking and memory processes while cognitive development refers to long-term changes in these processes. Here’s a better explanation by Piaget in his popular Psychological theory.
According to Jean Piaget’s (a renowned Swiss Psychologist) Theory of Cognitive Development, the children move through four different stages of brain development. The theory focuses on understanding, how young brains acquire knowledge and the nature of intelligence. As children take an active role in the learning process, make constant observations, and perform experiments their skills grows. Infact, interacting with other people adds more knowledge. He believed, cognitive development is a process which happens due to biological maturation.

Piaget’s Period Of Cognitive Development

Everyone knows, the preschool years are the most exciting and enthusiastic as a child is immersed in a highly social world. These social and cultural influences are providing the context and building the cognitive growth foundation. So, how can kids’ keep every detail in mind and solve problems? When they read a book, speak and watch a video, their young brains hold onto everything as processed info. The psychologists calls it the working memory. It underpins the child’s ability to learn. Working memory generates proper guidance to enhance the child’s decision-making process and behavior.

Yes, children’s thinking ability is tremendously developing by leaps and bounds. Especially at the age of three-five, every child’s brain begins to grow cognitively, and they require teachers to provide support and guidelines. Mentoring them with educational tools will engage the preschoolers’ thinking abilities and give a boundless exposure to their potentials.  

Square Panda inspires early learning by triggering the correct cognitive cords. There are various hallmarks in the pedagogy, which teachers must use to encourage and educate the early learners.

Here are some hallmarks on how to train the preschoolers through the lens of cognitive development.

1.Simple Reasoning and Problem-solving-

Young brains have thousands of questions and need explanations on how things work around. Teachers should pose and read aloud some thought-provoking questions for preschoolers to understand the natural causes of any phenomena, this will stimulate their cognitive abilities. Reasoning and problem solving is a technique which teachers can use to help students understand how and why things work.
For instance, Teachers can evolve their students curiosity levels by reading the different “how to” children books or guides. 

2.Growth of Social and Emotional Cognition-

Social Cognition refers to thinking about social situations and keeping emotions in control. Your child is a social being and in the pre-school years, children begin to expand their cognitive skills, and knows, how the social world works. Using the method of learning to play, they are able to grasp other people’s behaviors, displays their theory of mind and gain greater perspectives on the working of the world. Throughout their preschool years, their young brains learns to increase communication abilities and advances their cognitive workings.

3. Recollection and Boosting Memory-

Improving the capacity for memory and recollection is vital for young brains. Going hand in hand with metacognition, the children will recall their previous knowledge of different concepts. Metacognitive skills allow children to learn how to solve problems and generate thinking of their own. Using the mnemonic strategies is rudimentary in young children. Preschoolers should be able to exhibit their abilities to recall things, people, story, Etc. They should be able to address their family members.

Let’s use an example- A teacher can involve the students in book-reading or drawing activities which stimulate their ability to reflect on their own thinking. Then the teachers should ask them what they have learned from the book. It will aid the teachers to evaluate individual students learning capacity and the students will learn to recall, the teacher does the repetition of significant concepts in the story. 

4. Encourage Symbolic Play-

Symbolic representation is one of the major hallmarks of influencing the preschoolers. Their young brains begin to understand and decode the difference between things whether they are real or not. Children mostly recognises the characters in books or stories. Teachers should engage them in a symbolic play, it will inspire the children to participate in the make-believe/ pretend play. They learn the significance of real and fantasy.

For example- 

Children must be involved in the pretend to play as if they are the characters in the storybooks being read to them. Just like how in the Lagoon game, the Cameo- the chameleon’s character uses intonation, shows emotion and expression to indulge the child’s mind.

Conclusion-

Pedagogy could always nourish the child’s cognitive capabilities by optimally using all of the above hallmarks and approaches. Shape their actions, judgment, and build stronger motor skills using the learning theories and advanced phonics system.

Square Panda has some powerful findings on early childhood learning and program effectiveness.  We are helping kids ages 2 to 8 to learn to develop their Multisensory reading abilities i.e. reading using touch, sight, and sound.

Do you have the readiness to implement a cognitively rich experience for preschool children? Express your views and write to us in the comment section below.

Subscribe now to our Panda Blog and get the daily updates. Connect with us on our Social Media Account to explore more.

– Nidhi Parikh, SEO Content Writer, Square Panda India

We are extremely proud to tell you that we’ve won the ‘Parent And Teacher Choice Award‘ for 2019! Bestowed on us by a website that has been active longer than Google (!)–the website, HowToLearn.com, was started in 1996, while Google began in 1998–we were unanimously selected as the best early education system because of our “unique multisensory methods of teaching reading, as well as a library of games that truly engage the learners”.

About HowToLearn.com: This website went live two years before Google did, and is still kicking, successfully connecting parents, teachers, educators, and even resellers, with the best educational resources to enhance learning. Companies interested in boosting their online profile can throw their hat in the ring and enter their names. The best of the lot (like us!) will be chosen as the winner by a jury of parents and teachers, who base their decision on proven results, creativity, innovation, and the brain-building abilities of said company.

The first day back to school after a happy sunny summer vacation can be daunting for kids. Make sure you have everything they need; use our back-to-school guide for inspiration:

Back-To-School Parent’s Edition

– Keep up the summer learning, especially for younger learners. You don’t want your kids experiencing the ‘summer slide‘ as it is called, also the phenomenon of losing a portion of knowledge during the months of summer vacation. To keep up their skills and knowledge, introduce a portion of learning every day. Keep it simple–have them practice their name, say your phone number, correctly identify shapes and numbers.

Hint: Here’s how you can mix in fun even during summer learning…

– Offer to help. Touch base with the authorities in charge at your child’s school and ask if you can donate:

• • Your time (volunteer to be a part of some school committee)

• • Your money (which can be used for new school equipment)

• Your efforts (in the form of suggestions for new educational products, new suggestions, and more)

Schools will never say no to a helping hand.

– Make your child a goodie bag. Everyone loves a present.Hand over a brand-new item they can show off to friends, and your kid is grateful for life (or at least until the next week, when they think of something else they want). This goodie bag does not have to be extravagant or expensive; you can fill it up with cute new sunglasses, clay dough, new pencils and crayons, glue, even the goodie bag itself can all be potential ‘back-to-school’ gifts for your child.

Image by ALI TOMA from Pixabay

Back-To-School Teacher’s Edition

– ‘Theme’ up your classroom. Welcome your kids to school by decorating the classroom in a particular style–you can pick a place like the circus or the beach, fun movies like the Avengers, and even funny songs or rhymes. Choose one that you know your students will enjoy and watch their faces light up with happiness.

For example: For the theme ‘Jungle Book’, you can place cutouts of plants and trees around the classroom (or actual potted plants, if allowed), green streamers to resemble creepers, pictures of jungle animals around the desks, and random students can be Mowgli, Baloo, and Bagheera. You can even have them sing and dance to songs from the movie.

Image Source: https://bit.ly/2EGfMv4

– Break the ice between kids, again. They were best friends for a whole year, and then came their vacation. Maybe they play together, maybe not. Either way, get your students bonding again by group activities like sitting in a circle and saying what they did in the summer, or making them all special badges. Help them feel connected to each other, and the year will pass smoothly.

– Load their first day back (or even first few days back, if you can work it into the curriculum), with enjoyable activities like painting, drawing, or playing some type of learning games.

*check out our Instagram feed to see how introducing exciting educational games in the classroom magically reduces your students’ first day jitters.

Preparing kids to go back to school can be challenging (for you and them), but with enough preparation, you can make it through with flying colours!

Share your tips and tricks to getting kids ‘back-to-school’ ready; hit the comment section below!

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India

They come every year, without fail. As the weather turns from cool to hot, you lose almost half your body weight in perspiration.

You can heap curses on the weather gods for turning the heat up, you can even dream of taking a leave off work to stay home under the sweet embrace of your fans and ACs. Of course, all these heat-related woes will be nothing compared to your children’s/students’ disappointed faces if you haven’t managed to pack their vacation with as many fun summer activities as possible.

Image by Adina Voicu from Pixabay

We understand and sympathise with your time constraints, which is why we have compiled the following list of summer activities for kids to try out this summer:

Check out our comic strip on how to stay safe in summer before you take on these activities.

Check out all our comics on our Facebook or Instagram.

#1: Pool Time:

A nice refreshing dip in cool water sounds like heaven, doesn’t it? Try out some local swimming pools. Or take your kids on trips to places with pools/lakes. For a cheaper alternative, introduce bubble baths. You can make it more interesting by adding a ‘story’ element to the bath. Teachers, grab a hose! After all, water is still water.

#2: Mango Is King:

Who doesn’t love a sweet, juicy mango? Feed them mangoes (in moderation). Teach them easy, kid-friendly recipes incorporating mangoes, because it is never to early to learn to cook. Parents, you get a kitchen helper, and teachers, you get a parent’s eternal gratitude and devotion.

#3: Hobbies Need Time Too:

Playing with friends, practicing a sport, reading, or even lazing around; give all activities that your kids enjoy enough time. In fact, you can create a specially ‘curated’ list of activities for kids this summer, based on what they enjoy. We also recommend adding a small element of learning into summer fun, because we hate to see children experience the ‘summer slide’.

#4: Screen Time Can Be Healthy Too:

Not all screen time is bad. Choosing to let kids play-learn with educational games like ours, which are based on research and have proven results, can greatly help increase and enhance their knowledge. You can even spend some time finding resources on free streaming sites like YouTube, which is chock-full of educational videos on learning everything from numbers to nursery rhymes.

Stay tuned for more on why we think screen time with Square Panda is educationally beneficial…

Which activities are you leaning towards? Write to us in the comment section below.

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India

When I say the word ‘game’, what image comes to mind?

Is it a video game, complete with players in headsets blasting away at imaginary enemies?

Or do you go more old-school and imagine a rousing game of cricket or football?

What was previously strictly in the ‘fun’ category is now slowly entering the educational sector, with more and more schools globally adopting educational games into their curriculum. Serving as an aid and prop, these educational games explain concepts simple and complicated, reinforce learning, and give the teachers some much needed spare time while in the classroom.

We believe schools in India can benefit from this trend of using educational games as teaching aids too…here’s why:

Fact #1: If You Can’t Beat Them, Find A Way To Productively Join Them

There’s no way to escape ‘screen time’ or the time a person spends in front of the screen (which is 6 hours per day, on an average). Devices have infiltrated every aspect of our lives, and shows no signs of stopping. Introducing educational games will have dual benefits—your students are turning screen time into learning time, and this also serves to increase their digital literacy. Additionally, students will be better equipped for learning when their private lives are filled with similar media.

Fact #2: ‘Funning’ Up The Learning Process

Whether it is adding some new life to your classroom, or just trying to keep the students engaged, educational games can come to your rescue. Long experience has taught us that beginner learners acquire faster when taught through play. Adding an educational game to your existing aids mixes that fresh element of fun to the learning process.

Liked this image? Check out more on our Instagram and Facebook pages.

Fact #3: Fail ‘Safely’

These kinds of educational games rarely have any punishment for incorrect answers, at least not the traditional kind. The are mostly programmed to give out positive feedback even if learners are making mistakes. This feature ultimately boosts students’ confidence by having them ‘fail’ safely. Also, a “Whoops, try again!”, sounds so nice when it is coming from a cuddly little animated character, doesn’t it?

Fact #4: The Reward System Gets An Upgrade

Straying away from the traditional means of rewarding students, educational games give out bonus points, unlock new levels, and more, for well-performing students. This added motivation can enhance stimulation and engagement like little else can.

Fact #5: There Is Safety In This Game

It’s an educational game whose target audience is not allowed to cross the street by themselves; they cannot afford even a whisper that their game is an unsafe environment for kids. Most such games undertake very stringent measures to guarantee a safe and controlled playing space for users. Of course, we recommend taking the game(s) for a test drive before introducing them in your classrooms.

Psst, Square Panda offers a completely safe and ad-free environment for kids as they learn the English language.

Fact #6: Supercharged Learning

Educational games for kids are often an all-in-one kind of buffet, reinforcing many of the essential skills taught in the classroom, like social and emotional skills, fine and gross motor development, and more. Information taken in here is not static and one-dimensional, but constantly changing and interactive.

Fact #7: Instant Feedback

Learners get feedback on correct or incorrect words instantly. Teachers, too, get their students’ progress relayed to them as their charges are playing.

Fact #8: Learning To Learn

Children need to know learning is more than just rote memorization of facts and concepts. With educational games, they have an increased chance to fall in love with learning. These games show children a different way to learn, challenging their brain constantly, using different ways to train them in the subject, increasing their all-round development and problem-solving skills.

Fact #9: What Gap?

Research shows children from upper income households often produce better results than children from lower income households. Schools can do their part to reduce the gap by incorporating an educational game into the curriculum. Each child gets equal playing time, constant repetition and subsequent reinforcement of essential concepts.

Like anything else, there are challenges to using educational games in the classroom—teachers have to know the game before they can teach students to learn with it, there might not be sufficient resources to get this technology into the school, and integrating the game with the existing lessons. Square Panda anticipated this problem and provides teacher resources, along with a lesson plan suggestions, to ensure smooth implementation of its educational games in teaching. You can also browse through our game page, which gives you a glimpse into our amazing array of learning games for toddlers and kids aged 2-8.

So are you ‘game’ to try this new teaching assistant? Share your views with us! Which kind of learning game would you prefer in your classroom?

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India

Isn’t it funny how a wrinkled, pink organ that weighs only about 1.3 gms (approximately 2% of your body weight) is the deciding factor in almost every activity you perform?

Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay

Guiding most of your behaviour, this complex organ is the nexus of all learning, meaning we spend a lot of time trying to shape this organ to perform optimally.

Beginning at inception itself, the brain is given high priority, and is nourished with a constant diet of ‘brainfood’, educational stimulation, and an enriching environment.

Then begins formal education, specially designed to mould young minds into the future. You, the educators, give everything you have to sculpt accomplished and fully functioning adult minds from the current juvenile brains you have been entrusted with.

Unfortunately, you cannot know which tactic is working, and which one is failing dreadfully. You cannot possibly measure the effect your teaching has on an impressionable young learner.

Square Panda is very aware that educators all over face the same issue, and so, conducted our own research (see our core team here) and referenced data from experts in the same field. We created a curriculum that is based on those findings, and came up with a learning system that focuses on training an early learner in language acquisition using the most optimal learning styles possible.

To help you understand the research that went into creating the Square Panda phonics learning platform, we compiled all our findings on neuroscience and the early learner:

To read about the early learner’s reading brain, view our previous post.

1) The human brain has no natural correspondence between the spoken language and print concepts (writing). New functional connections need to be formed between the visual and the language systems. (Dehaene, & Cohen, 2007)

2) Kids benefit the most from a systematic instruction that will help them:

• Become aware of the sound structure of syllables (phonology)
• Isolate the units (phonemes) within syllables
• Identify which letters go with which phonemes
• Blend letter sounds together into words
• Use multisensory cues during learning

3) The above benefits multiply when children are taught these skills at an early age.

4) Studies have shown that specialised brain regions integrate each letter with its respective speech sound; these regions are especially active when this letter and its sound are presented in a multisensory fashion. (Van Atteveldt et al., 2004; Blau et al., 2009; Blau et al., 2010)

5) The research team led by Stanford University neuroscience researcher (who partners with Square Panda), Dr. Bruce McCandliss, said that the rapid brain response to newly learnt words were influenced by the way they were learnt. Words that were learnt through letter-sound instruction showed neural activity in the left side of the brain, the part of the brain that encompasses the visual and language regions.

6) Systematic phonics instruction is much more effective in grades PreK-1 than in later grades and leads to higher achievement in reading, spelling, word recognition, and comprehension. (National Reading Panel, 2000)

7) For students struggling with language acquisition, multisensory cues may provide complementary information that helps them overcome learning difficulties. (Montessori, 1967; Birsh, 1999; Reid, 2013)

8) Instruction that covers key components of reading, like phonemic awareness and phonics, in English, has a clear benefit for students who do not speak English at home, aka, non-English speaking students. (NICHD, 2000)

9) The instructions and teaching for non-English speaking students should include work with phonemes and phoneme combinations that do not exist in their native language or home language. (National Literacy Panel, 2006)

We believe in teaching the early learner’s brain, which is why our curriculum is largely based on the neuroscience research mentioned above.

Watch our VP of Curriculum and Research, Dr. Vera Blau-McCandliss, talk about early childhood literacy and how we use neuroscience research in our learning system, here.

I hope our article helped every educator out there understand their student’s brain a little better. Visit our website www.squarepanda.in for more information on our neuroscience research into early childhood literacy and the reading brain.

Give us your views on the usage of neuroscience in early education. Start a dialogue in the comment section below.

– Sanjana Shukla, Content Writer, Square Panda India