Games and Learning

Teach Your Monster to Read is a free award-winning game from The Usborne Foundation designed to help children to practice the key first stages of reading. We caught up with the team who built the game to find out about their process and what they’ve learned along the way about game design, marketing and testing with kids: Antonio Gould (a freelance digital producer) and Berbank Green and Jonathan Skuse of Popleaf.

Tell me about the roles that each of you have on Teach Your Monster to Read (TYMTR)?

A Teach Your Monster to Read character

Jonathan: Popleaf are the core game development team, we do the programming, design, music, some graphic design, bits of everything really.

Antonio is the Usborne Foundation’s producer, and was responsible for putting the team together, representing the interests of the charity and making sure everything was on track for the educational goals and guiding the project as a whole.

Other core members of the build team included Rich Wake, who does all of the brilliant character design, illustration; Angela Colvert and Alison Colvert from Roehampton University, and Mairi McKinnon from Usborne Publishing who were in charge of our educational outcomes, plus a wide team of other people who’ve helped along the way.

So how did the project start?

Jonathan: Berbank and I were friends before. We had both started at a company that doesn’t exist any more called Creature Labs. After that, we went our separate ways, but remained friends. I was working at Jagex on Runescape during its peak, Berbank was working with Martin Hollis on Bonsai Barber, which never got the success it deserved. Around the same time we both wanted to do something new, so we sort of fell into it – we almost set up the company (Popleaf) by accident.

The TYMTR project was initiated by Peter Usborne (founder of Usborne Publishing) who with his daughter Nicola was running a literacy charity called the Usborne Foundation. They had an idea that they wanted to do a game around learning to read and decided to pull a team together to make it happen.

Berbank: We all wanted it to be very addictive, making it about fun first so children would come back to it and learn along the way, ideally without even knowing they were learning. One of the first things Peter (Usborne) said was that it had to be a game that they came back to again and again. We couldn’t have agreed more.

Jonathan: The majority of educational games are quite drab. Often, they don’t feel like a game, there is no sense of joy. The intentions are clear but it’s very dry “you’re going to do this now because I say so” rather than “you are an autonomous being who might want to do this…”.

Berbank: We were lucky to work with some good games companies before, but this really was a dream project we couldn’t refuse.

Jonathan. We felt if we were going to spend so much time doing something, we wanted it to be worthwhile.

Berbank: And it has been. It’s so rewarding to see kids eyes light up playing a game like this. We both had trouble at school, so it is a privilege to make a game for children who have similar difficulties.

The TYMTR team discuss the game

Antonio: One of the things that was interesting about this project was that Usborne didn’t go to an agency but instead hired independent freelancers which is quite a different model. By hiring independent people there’s been a much stronger and longer term connection with the project.

But then it was about putting that team together. There has been a really long process of finding people, sifting through them, finding the best. Ended up speaking to over 20 people for the roles that become Popleaf, and also worked with Margaret Robertson (another independent game designer). We looked at over 200 illustrators to find Rich, and easily 100 voiceover artists to find Simon Farnaby.

Tell me about the process for developing TYMTR

Jonathan: what we started off with was totally stripped down mechanical prototypes with the idea being that if a kid would enjoy those they would really enjoy a richer version.

Particularly in children’s games, I think, a lot of what makes it something that’s fun is not just gameplay in a traditional sense – a lot of it is the heft, the texture, the color, the sound, the substance. People talk about making things ”juicy”, so every action has a really nice reaction, making everything very immediate. But if you prototype with all that stuff in you can easily lose sight of whether that underlying mechanics are any good.
Jonathan Skuse, Popleaf

Berbank: We were incorporating the educational aims from the very beginning so we could make sure they were fun. They had to meet the requirements we were getting from our excellent educational advisors at Roehampton University and from experts within Usborne Publishing.

An early prototype of the “Run” game

Antonio: Some of the minigames are exactly the same as the first prototypes but some are completely different. One of the games

called “Run” had number of prototypes, four entirely different versions to get it right. Even then, some kids were struggling to pick it up. However, once they understood it they really loved it. We had to have a bit of a leap of faith that even though they wouldn’t get it straight away would work. It needed a bit of time to get right

Berbank: There was a lot of watching how the children were playing the games and what sort of difficulties they were having. With ‘Run’ in particular we had some difficulties conveying information to them properly, and it took a number of iterations to work out something that was clear, particularly given the speed of the game. They also struggled with the accuracy of the jump, but they were keeping at it, because that was a struggle they enjoyed. Once they’d mastered that, their sense of accomplishment was huge. Had we not had the patience to wait that out, we might have removed that game. Those are two different issues to tease apart from a player who isn’t necessarily consciously aware of why they like certain parts and not others.

The released version of the “Run” game

Jonathan: There is a particular way of teaching Phonics in phases in the UK. We followed that, so the first game covers phases 2 and 3, the 2nd game phase 4, and so on. The difficulty was not in deciding what to teach but how we were going to teach it.

We were lucky to have teachers on hand in numerous design meetings so we could turn to them to tell us how they teach things in the classroom. English is a confusing language, and I don’t think any of us really understood that until we had to really study it. I think, in designing educational games, having teachers available, and ideally in design meetings, is essential. We couldn’t have done it without their help.

Antonio: Building on what Jonathan said, I should mention that even before teachers were involved we had Roehampton University involved. They were ex teachers, it’s a teacher training college, so they are really knowledgeable about the pedagogy . They gave us a scheme of work that kids need to get through. So they gave us a curriculum of stuff and we had to push them really hard to find out what the balance of that should be, for example how many times should you practice this over that. They didn’t like being pinned down but we needed them to do so. They’ll say, in a letter and sound matching game, you want to see two letters on screen, then you hear a sound and to select the right letter, then Jonathan and Berbank went away and said ok we’re going to do this with a sheep game and you have two pens and want to take the sheep into one or the other. So to their specifics about the educational mechanics we bring the game aspects.

Jonathan: There were lots of moments where we needed to go back and restructure, particularly around which order to have things in e.g graphic then sound then graphic. But then making it interactive is the challenge – there are only so many ways you can represent matching a grapheme to a phoneme and make it fun.

Antonio: One point to mention, we’re using the terminology “teach” but there is actually a debate about how much of this is teaching and how much of it is practicing. We try to concentrate on practicing. We do introduce stuff but most of the time kids are actually practicing over and over again. Teachers told us that it’s not the teaching but it’s kids doing it again and again and getting that automaticity that’s the key. Kids might get some of these things the first time but will forget them – our game helps them to remember.

Berbank: Another thing to consider was the motor skill level for what are mostly 5 year olds. What do they see on screen, is it enough but not too much? Is it accessible to them? Some children had a little trouble with the mouse and we discovered quite early on that dragging and double-clicking weren’t going to be options.

Antonio: When I did the initial competitor research on apps for learning to read, I was staggered. I couldn’t find an app that didn’t have some information that you had to already be able read to use it. It’s not actually that hard to make stuff comprehensible. I don’t think it’s such a huge UX challenge to make sure things are done vocally in a way that children understand

Jonathan: Children’s games do have a tendency to over instruct.

Berbank: So we developed a visual language.

Jonathan: TYMTR has common visual cues throughout. Games have a tendency to treat children as idiots, but kids are happy to experiment so long as you create a world where they can try out the controls without it costing them anything. You don’t want to have too many fail conditions as it’s upsetting and negative and demotivates them.

Berbank. We wanted to make the fail conditions funny, or at least fun.

Jonathan: …and make them loop round, so you just go back to the end of the current section and do it again. This makes the cost of not knowing how to play much lower, if it’s low enough kids are emboldened. Or at least, that’s what we try and do, I’m not sure we do it as much as would like, maybe with the third game.

The Space Race game from TYMTR

Antonio: Jonathan and Berbank have shown a real sensitivity to that. In the sheep game, for example, when you get it wrong the sheep just run away and it’s funny. Although, one worry is that kids will get it wrong intentionally, and that played out a bit with the prototypes but we fixed it. You have to work on this to get it right and it’s those tiny things that make such a difference.

Berbank: It also means we can maintain a level of control through all aspects of the design and development.

Jonathan: For example, we can be in the studio with the voiceover artist so we can give immediate feedback, because we wrote it, we know it so well. For this project, it was the only way we could have built it.

Antonio: So it feels more like a startup than a commissioned project. In the past, projects have suffered because the publisher / commissioner has been responsible for marketing and engagement, it’s gutting when you spend a lot of time on something but aren’t in control of helping to get it out there. But on this we’ve had control on that as a team so have had time to develop that.

Tell me more about the marketing you did, what worked and what didn’t?

Antonio: So our first marketing plan was, OK there are about 800 things that we could do, so let’s try all of them. We tried lots of different things and were really agile. Some things worked and some didn’t. For example, everyone said go for the mum bloggers, but it didn’t work at all, for reasons that seems obvious now.

This is a service that has a game at it’s centre, the service helps children with their reading. That’s very important to understand. Most usage from teachers setting up kids on it and using throughout the year. Teachers provide us with most of our game play, 50% of people who sign up to the game sign up because they’ve heard about it from one of those teachers.

Everyone has to go to school, but not everyone gets engagement at home, so for those kids who need it most we needed to get it into schools, especially to teachers.

It took a while to learn this, we had to get enough people signed up and had to get analytics in order (but this was really hard, there was so much data coming through) but we’ve done that now and have a model for how it works. Teachers tell parents. Also, mum bloggers are so saturated.

Jonathan: Could the reason be that because we built the game around the existing curriculum and tools that help them, it make their lives easier? Whereas a lot of games don’t do that.

Antonio: When we started we didn’t have a community manager and instead relied on tweets from people we know, some emails and a bit of PR. Didn’t have much, but it got into a few educational journals etc, and just built and built very slowly. Then we got our community manager Dannie Price involved who’s rocket boosted that process to make sure we’re being responsive to people replying on social media.

With games sales, you often see a massive spike at the beginning, but our game, starting with no-one and building from there, when you take out the effect of the school term, it goes up in a linear fashion. But it is actually quite tied to terms, you get lots in 1st, more in 2nd, less in 3rd. So we’re just trying to help that along.
Antonio Gould, Usborne Foundation

Where next for TYMTR?

Jonathan: We’re still in the very early stages on game three, which is going to cover phase 5. It’s a really weird phase because in a lot of way it tears up the rule book as kids have known it up to that point. Phase 5 seems to say, well, all that stuff we told you earlier, here are all the exceptions. There is a huge volume of extra content, filling in the gaps. So we need to make a game which is far more playable over a prolonged time.

Hopefully, it’s going to be more like a thing you come back to weekly and it will always present you with a fresh challenge. That’s going to be a big challenge, a hugely difficult thing to do. Also, just finding a way to communicate all this content in a way isn’t going to terrify or bore children.

Are phonics still a bit controversial?

Jonathan: I know it’s effective for a number, and presumably a large number of children, but it would be a bad idea to say it’s the only way to learn as clearly different children have different needs. We’re building a game for children who learn well this way. Personally, I really struggled with school, and never went to university because by the end of school I was convinced I was incapable. So, I know for someone like me it would have been very useful in terms of building confidence.

Antonio: I would have said exactly that. For me the two problems that people have with phonics are not really about phonics, but are really about teachers not being given the freedom to teach in the way they feel is right for that particular child. This is a tool to be applied in a way for those kids that it works. People also think it doesn’t take into account a love of reading, but this is the Usborne Foundation. No-one could accuse them of not being about kids of love of reading.

Jonathan. We’re not tubthumping for phonics, certainly. Something that sticks in my mind was testing the 2nd game in quite a disadvantaged school. There were two kids who were difficult to teach kids, and the teacher said he’d never seen them sit still and engage for so long with something, ever. Regardless of how you feel about phonics, sitting down and engaging with practice, drilling in this way, can’t be anything but good for them.

Berbank: Even if they aren’t getting it right, getting exposure to the letter sounds over and over again is useful.

What would be your one piece of advice or main lesson that you’ve learned from creating TYMTR?

Jonathan: Well, one thing this project embodies is the spirit of iteration.

Berbank: Certainly getting experts in their field, right from the beginning has been incredibly useful. The teachers we worked with were – and are – invaluable, particularly Matt (at Snowfield).

Jonathan: Don’t assume you understand education, without getting those people involved all the way along, on the end of the phone.

Berbank: Also listen to the children. If you ask them leading questions they will give the answer you want, but not necessarily the answer you need. If you spend the time to just listen, watch them play, and don’t interrupt, you will learn so much more.

Editor’s Note: This piece originally ran at EduGamesHub, a community of learning game developers based in London, and is reposted here with permission.