Product Review of Elevate – Brain Training

educators might encourage learners to use Elevate to hone vocabulary skills in games that test word connotation, and they might encourage older learners to drill their middle school math facts and number sense with some of the math games. Teachers might also have learners use Elevate as a daily warm-up to grow listening, reading, speaking, writing, and core math skills. Keep in mind that users can’t control which three games will be available each day, and some activities might be better connected to classroom activities than others.

Elevate is built to hone skills such as focus, processing, and concentration across a range of ELA and math tasks. The diversity of subjects is admirable, and there’s some cool content: Playing a game to learn to remember people’s names isn’t a bad real-world skill to develop. However, not all tasks are as challenging as others; a lot of tasks focus more on quick thinking than on content knowledge. Each game focuses on lightning-fast decision-making. While that’s a great goal, developers have assumed a very high level of prior knowledge and haven’t provided much support for users to develop that knowledge. Limited feedback is available to help users get a missed question right the next time it appears. The developers have added an un-timed study mode, which is a helpful way to play the games and get more practice on the tasks.

Questions that test users’ knowledge of English grammar assume a high level of English fluency but offer no opportunity to revisit or review grammar rules or the extensive vocabulary in the app. A built-in glossary or grammar lessons would offer better support on the language tests, as would some primers on estimation and number sense in the math sections. Overall, this is a slick, fun way to hone your skills, but it might really work best for adults who are fluent in English and already have a pretty advanced grasp of a lot of information.

Website: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.wonder

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id875063456?uo=4&at=10laCG&ct=website

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00L2SL56C?tag=comsenmed07-20

Overall User Consensus About the App

Student Engagement

Each day’s games are great fun. Whether it’s popping balloons or building a tower by picking correct words, games are entertaining to play again and again.

Curriculum and Instruction

Some games seem a little superficial, and there’s an assumed high level of prior knowledge and no instruction for vocabulary or grammar rules. Still, you can hone some skills and get good feedback.

Customer Support

Interface is straightforward and easy to navigate, and the settings menu offers good customization options. Unfortunately, most of the iOS accessibility features are not available in the games.