Client: Center for the Collaborative Classroom
Category: Educational Publishing
Scope: app design
Project Objectives: The goal of this project was to design a student-facing tablet app to make word practice more fun and engaging. In addition to Being a Reader™ classroom lessons, this app provides students with additional word practice games such as: Build That Word! where players build words using a set of letter tiles, and Sort It Out! that includes both closed and open sorting games.
Illustrations are by Michael Wertz.
’Berta’s Role
’Berta worked closely with the team to design the wireframes and conceptualize the play scenarios. She and the team also:
- chose an illustrator with a fun, engaging style and provided him with the wireframes, which he redrew in his style.
- iterated the scenes, interactive elements, and functionality to be intuitive for players.
- tested and retested the releases and gave extensive feedback to the developers.
- determined the sequence of play, and suggest rewards at the end of completed games.
- provided all assets to the developer to create the final screens and animations.
Home Screen
From the home screen, the player chooses a game type and goes to a selector screen to choose the lesson week. Players can navigate from all screens back to the Home screen via the Home icon.
Build That Word Game Screen—Cargo Ship
- Students listen to words being said, then use the tiles to assemble them in the build area.
- Once the tiles are all assembled and the game is solved, there is an animated reward.
Screens Showing Example of “Build That Word” Game Sequence
Open Sort Game Screen
Open-ended sorting games let students organize words by sound, meaning, spelling, or any other attribute.
Screens Showing Example of “Build That Word” Open Sort Game Sequence
Screens Showing Example of “Build That Word” Word Sort Game Sequence
Final Results and Deliverables
- This is the first student-facing product for Collaborative Classroom, and will be the litmus test for future product development.
- This app is closely aligned with, and reinforces, the lesson sequences and pedagogy.
- The app launched to much anticipation by Being a Reader teachers and field staff, who are excited to show it to their customers.
Check out the app on the Apple App Store or Google Play.
App Game Animation Sequence