Announcing the Create a Character Contest Winners!

• November 19, 2010 by Norene Wiesen

Boy did we have fun judging the Back-to-School Create a Character contest!  Who knew there was such fantastic creativity and imagination out there just waiting to be unleashed?

I am pleased to present the winning entries:

1^st Place: “Danny Dinosaur” (Written description only)

“Danny Dinosaur is a dinosaur, a T-rex to be exact.  He’s a T-rex who loves food and destruction.  He’s blue and green and loves potatoes.  That’s why he lives in Boise, Idaho, “Home of the Potato.” But that’s not all Danny Dinosaur eats.  He also eats any thing that’s alive.

There’s a bird named Short Stalk who follows Danny Dinosaur every where he goes.  Short stalk is a small, yellow, and pink beaked fella but Danny Dinosaur is a large Dinosaur with an evil smile and sharp teeth sticking out.  Although they have several differences, they are still best friends.  That proves what a unique but odd dinosaur Danny dinosaur is.

The game Danny Dinosaur will be in is called the Flying Dino.  There will be a sentence above the dinosaur, which he will read.  The sentence will have one word missing and the player needs to fill in that blank with the correct word.  If it is right the bird will pick up the word with its beak, fly towards the sentence and fill in the blank.  That would be 3 points.  If it is wrong the bird will correct you and you will get 0 points.”

Danny Dinosaur’s creator, an 8^th grade student in MA, wins a Flip Video camera!

2^nd Place: “Silly Snake”

“Name of character – Silly Snake
He is green with blue eyes and a red tongue.
Silly Snake lives in a cave.
He eats various animals with words on them.
If it is a word he did not say, he spits it out.
When he eats a correct word, he gets closer to his cave.
When he eats incorrect words, he moves away from his cave.”

Silly Snake’s creator, a 4^th grade student in RI, wins a $25 gift card from amazon.com!

3^rd Place: “Randy de la Cruz” (lives in Miami FL)

“My character’s name is Randy de la Cruz.  He lives in Miami, Florida.  He has a girlfriend named Maria and he loves his family.  My character has 4 arms.  It has a blue shirt, orange pants, long boots that are blue, a hat that is black, yellow, and red.  He wears a white belt, glasses, and a necklace.  The two top arms are bigger then the lower arms.  His two feet are like human feet.  He has a head like an alien.  On his hat he has a G for Great Man.  This character has pointy hair.  He is 20 years old.  Randy likes eating meat and rice but, his favorite foods are fish and chicken.  He works at Universal Studios in Florida as an actor.  When he was 17 to 19 he used to work as a carpenter with his step father.  Randy likes drawing and at night he likes to look at the stars.

Randy also likes to help the kids learn new words and he reads stories to kids on the computer.  After he reads a story, Randy asks question to see if they were listening.  The other thing he does to help the kids is to break hard words from the story in parts.  Then the kids have to read and say it completely.  For example, he reads the word “generous” and he breaks it in parts like ge ne rous and the kid hears it on a headphone.  Then the kid says the word completely in a microphone.  Randy is a nice man and likes helping people and making friends.  He will like to be your friend too.”

Randy de la Cruz’s creator, an 8^th grade student in MA, wins a $25 gift card from amazon.com!

The contest judges here at Scientific Learning would like to extend a big “thank you” to all of our contest entrants for entertaining us with your inspired drawings, stories, and game ideas.

And might I just say, nice showing New England!

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Categories: Fast ForWord

Tags: arts, creativity, Fast ForWord characters, learning through play, writing

Students Make the Same Reading Gain
in Half the Time with Fast ForWord Language v2

• October 6, 2010 by Andrew Ostarello

In 2008, Scientific Learning introduced a major update to Fast ForWord Language – our award-winning flagship product for language development in elementary-school-aged children. We will discuss the improvements present in the new version of the software: Fast ForWord Language version 2 (or “v2” for short). 

Product development at Scientific Learning occurs with the support of five key areas of research:

• Basic, foundational research
• University-based Research
• Studies conducted by schools using Fast ForWord products
• Detailed Fast ForWord product use data
• Outcomes data such as high-stakes reading and language assessments

We looked at these data sources and decided that we could substantially enhance the Fast ForWord Language experience. We set out to create a completely upgraded version of the software.

We had four primary goals for this revision:

• Increase the number of trials a student performed in a session.
• Increase the overall engagement level of the products by overhauling the graphics and updating the game designs.
• Decrease the time required for students to complete Fast ForWord Language, while
• Maintaining the same levels of learning gain.

As each student uses Fast ForWord software, their machine sends product use data back to Scientific Learning databases in real time. These data are filtered to the Innovation and Research Department for analysis. After we’d developed and released Language v2, we naturally wanted to verify that we’d met our four goals. A few months after release, we used a data mining approach to compare the performance of Language v1 to the performance of Language v2.

Data mining is a very data-hungry process, but our database is broad enough that we’re swimming in data. We ended up with a rich data set containing data from over 16,000 students who used either Language v1 or Language v2. 

Here is what we found regarding our first goal: Increased trial count. In an average 50-minute session, Language v2 users performed 21% more trials than Language v1 users.

Our second goal was to increase student engagement. We created new exercises and introduced new characters. For example, we created Whaliens. The core exercise is the same as Phonic Match in Language v1, but the graphics are better, there are many more exciting animations, and there are multiple new visual indicators of student progress. In addition, lots of significant revisions were made to the stimuli and educational design of this and other exercises. These revisions help create a more enticing experience for students.

Our third goal: We wanted to decrease time to completion. The most exciting finding is that Language v2 takes HALF the time to complete that Language v1 does. This means that students who use Language v2 can finish and start the next Fast ForWord product in their sequence more quickly.

Finally, did we meet our goal of having equivalent learning gain? We found that Language v2 users make 50% more reading gain per hour of use than Language v1 users. Combined with the fact that Language v2 takes about half the time to complete,  it turns out that the total reading gains from v1 and v2 are statistically indistinguishable from each other. 

So Language v2 provides equivalent reading and language gains in half the time of Language v1. This leads to the conclusion that, in addition to offering a more engaging and intensive Fast ForWord experience, Language v2 is twice as efficient as Language v1.

To learn more, visit our Fast ForWord Language v2 product page. 

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Categories: Fast ForWord, Reading & Learning, Scientific Learning Research

Tags: accelerate learning, brain training, elementary school learning, Fast ForWord characters, improving reading skills

Announcing the Back-to-School Create a Character Contest!

• August 26, 2010 by Carrie Gajowski

Scientific Learning is sponsoring a Back-to-School Create a Character Contest from August 25, 2010 – November 1, 2010.  The contest is open to any teacher, other educator, or student over the age of 5 (with their parents’ permission).  Entrant must be a resident of the United States or Canada (excluding Quebec). 

If I want to enter, what should my entry include?

Send us a written description of a new Fast ForWord® character. Consider including a name, a physical description, where the character would live, what it would do and eat, and any other information that you think we should know about the character.  Pictures of the character are encouraged, but not required. Animations should not be submitted.  Make sure that what you send is clear and legible.  Only original work will be accepted and you must have all rights and permissions to use it.

What can I win?

• 1st prize:  Flip camera
• 2nd and 3rd prizes:  $25 gift cards from Amazon.com

How do I enter? 

• Send a completed and signed entry form and your Submission by regular mail to:

                Create a Character Contest
                Scientific Learning Corporation
                300 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, Suite 600
                Oakland, CA 94612

• Entrants 13 and over may also send their completed and signed entry forms and submissions by email to cgajowski@scilearn.com.  Entrants under 13 may not enter via email, only by regular mail.  

The winners will be announced on or before November 23, 2010. 

Watch the video created by Greg Allen, Senior Artist at Scientific Learning, to see how one of the Fast ForWord characters is created or to get some ideas to get started! Click here for the contest entry form, or here for the official contest rules.

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Categories: Brain Fitness, Fast ForWord

Tags: creativity, Fast ForWord characters, video, writing

Dress up Your Firefox Browser with Your Favorite Fast ForWord® Character

• May 26, 2010 by Norene Wiesen

If you love the Fast ForWord characters as much as I do, here’s a fun little freebie: Firefox can now “wear” your favorite characters!  This is a simple add-on that can liven up your lab or classroom computers and inspire your students, whether or not they are currently working on the Fast ForWord exercises.

Five Fast ForWord characters are currently available for Firefox: Ele-bot and Cosmic Reader from the LANGUAGE Series products, Sky Rider and Lunar Leap from the LITERACY Series products, and Jitterbug Jukebox from the READING Series products.  More characters coming soon!

What do to:

1. Be sure you’re using Firefox!  Steps 2 and 3 will not work in any other browser.
2. Add Firefox Personas to your browser (it’s easy)
3. Select a character for Firefox to “wear”

That’s it—you’re done!

Here's what some of us at our Oakland, CA, headquarters are wearing:

Valerie
Role: Private Provider Relations Specialist
Persona: Cosmic Reader—Fast ForWord LANGUAGE Series
Quote: "Cosmic Reader is my hero."

Vivian
Role: Corporate Receptionist
Persona: Sky Rider—Fast ForWord LITERACY Series
Quote: "Ooh, I like these colors."

Andrew
Role: Lead Research Statistician
Persona: Jitterbug Jukebox—Fast ForWord READING Series
Quote: “Jitterbug Jukebox really speaks to me.  I often feel like the flyest fly around.  Plus, I wear cool shades, like... 95% of the time.”

Want to let us know what you think about the Fast ForWord Personas for Firefox?  Join us on Facebook and join the conversation!

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Categories: Fast ForWord

Tags: Fast ForWord characters, motivating students