Playful Weekends #4: 10 Dimensions of evaluating a learning product
How do you evaluate if a learning product is important for your child?
Before we dive in, a brief update from the Upepo early access launch!
We’ve had so many new users joining us since our launch and it’s heartwarming to see the different kinds of projects that kids are working on and submitting! Look forward to seeing more children on Upepo this week!
What’s new?
Our Best out of Waste Challenge is live till the 20th of July! Encourage your child to participate soon!
The Lights, Camera, Action Challenge was completed successfully and winners were announced! Congratulations!
1st Place: Yashika
2nd Place: Joy
3rd Place: Shriyadita
Stay tuned for new creative projects lined up from some of the most loved creators in the world!
Download here: https://www.upepo.in/
Now, back to our article
If you’re a parent or an educator, chances are that there are hundreds of thousands of toys, games, apps, and learning products fighting for your attention every second of your waking lives! They show up on blogs, social media, television, websites, and everywhere. (Much like me showing you the Upepo app before starting this article!)
Now how do you evaluate if a product is important for your child and whether you should part with your money for it?
Currently, most people look at these metrics:
Price
Quality
Safety
Timing
What other parents are saying
How long will my child be occupied with it?
Will they learn anything from it?
Are there other experts/influencers saying good things about it?
If any, How bad was the last tantrum?
If any, How bad will the next tantrum be if you don’t buy it?
These are great and important. However, as learning science improves and our understanding of these products improves we need to be more aware as consumers. At Harvard, I had the chance to take the T-519 course from Dr.Bertrand Schneider, a leading education researcher. In this course, we used a 10-Dimensional metric to evaluate any learning product. And many of these metrics drive our product at Upepo!
Remember that there is no blanket ‘score’ or' ‘mark’ that you can assign. Instead you can comprehensively evaluate it across a wide range of parameters.
10 Dimensions of Learning Products
General Information: Are the learning goals advertised specifically? If they mentioned improved math skills, does it say which skills exactly?
Instructions: Are there specific instructions & guidance available for children/caregivers to use this product? Are there specific learning activities?
Learning Philosophy: What is the exact learning theory behind the product? Is it driven by instructions - like passive watching of a video? Or by construction - actively building and creating things? (32 Learning theories simplified - link)
Cognitive/Conceptual: How exactly is the learning theory from point three implemented in the product? Does it help learners achieve the goals stated by the product and stay true to the learning theory?
Emotional Components: Does this learning product directly address any emotional or affective parts of a child’s development? Does it address motivation, excitement, or mindsets?
Social/Community: Does this product encourage students to be alone or does it encourage you to be immersed in communities? Do you use the toy alone or in a group with other kids?
Ergonomics: Is the product intuitive to use? If it needs a lot of instructions and learning, does the product enable the user to learn those through other means (manuals, videos), etc?
Technological Suitability: Is the technology justified for the intended goals? Is the technology component truly adding value?
Uniqueness: What other products exist like the one you’re looking at? How does this product provide you more or less value than the others?
Accessibility: How easy is it for your child to use this product? Do they have special learning needs? Is the product contextual to your child in terms of geography, popular culture references, etc?
Example: Parents are made to see advertisers put ‘Montessori toys’ on listings of products that have nothing to do with Montessori frameworks. Here’s a great analysis by @theunskilledartist on Instagram.
This may sound clinical and dull but pick any learning product around you and try to apply these to your context! Here is a simple table for you!
Once you try it out, let me know which learning product (toy, app, experience, website, etc) you have evaluated and we can share it with the entire community!
Have a playful weekend,
Prasanth