Interview with Bill Kara, CEO and Founder of TeachMe and Addicting Games

Typing is so ubiquitous that it's easy to forget that it is a skill that must be learned. How can learning to type be engaging, effective, and even fun? TeachMe has developed typeracer, a game-based typing instruction program that helps students learn to type and also how to create documents and to interact. Welcome to an interview with Bill Kara, CEO and founder of TeachMe and Addicting Games.

1. What is your name and your background?

My name is Bill Kara and I’m the CEO/founder of TeachMe and Addicting Games.  I oversee the company’s operations, growth strategies and product development. A lifelong gamer and entrepreneur, I’ve been in the gaming industry for over 20 years and have a passion for blending gaming and learning. I previously co-founded gaming company Hallpass Media, which was acquired in a roll up to create Jam City in 2011. Prior to Hallpass Media I founded Addicting Games which was acquired by Atom Entertainment before being purchased by Viacom shortly afterwards in 2006.

 

2. How did you get interested in e-learning? 

With two young daughters at home, I wanted to create games aimed at making learning skills fun and rewarding with TeachMe; experiences that offer more than just superficial fun on the surface. I’d always been interested in making learning more accessible through games and when I saw existing content out there was full of messages you wouldn’t want your kids to see (not to mention the titles were just really low quality), created by people that weren’t really passionate about either education or gaming as a hobby, I decided to create TeachMe as a way to fill that void. I wanted to combine these worlds of learning and play in a powerful new way with a vision that could change the lives of millions of children around the world.

 

 3.  Why are typing skills important now? 

Typing remains a fundamental skill, and it is one of the most foundational, yet important life skills you can learn. Learning to type fast and accurately has so many real world applications in this day-and-age - it’s an essential skill for anyone working with a computer (which is just about any profession) in any capacity. Typing effectively helps you to work comfortably and more efficiently, it aids in timely communication with colleagues and customers, creating documents, and finding new information and much more.

 

 

 

4.  What is your philosophy about skill-building in an e-learning environment?

Teachers want a powerful tool to complement their expertise, their passion, their skill. Parents want the best education possible for their children. Children want to play online, to master a skill, to feel like they’re growing and learning. With that in mind, we realized that education was moving in one direction and entertainment was moving in another. As parents, we have very little insight into how our kids are learning, what areas they found challenging and the speed they were progressing. And after further research we found a lack of e-learning resources customized to empower the strongest students to continue to excel while addressing the learning gaps faced by those that may be struggling a bit. We hope that games like TypeRacer, alongside the other offerings on our TeachMe properties help fulfill both objectives that also prioritizes fun.

 

5.  What is your program and how does it work?

TeachMe’s games and apps bring new meaning to the phrase “customized learning”. We teach students to master a skill instead of simply answering a question. And the games change based on who’s playing: their mastery of that skill, as well as their experience levels. As the learner gets better, the game — the curriculum — changes to match the optimal level of difficulty. Players pay attention longer and they learn more, which helps ensure their time online is never wasted.

 

As part of the TeachMe family of products, TypeRacer, allows people to race each other by typing quotes from books, movies, and songs. It is the first multiplayer typing game on the web. Millions of people from all over the globe have completed hundreds of millions of races on TypeRacer, improving their typing speed by as much as 50 words-per-minute.

 

6.  Please provide an example of a success :) 

As parents and kids grapple with back to school season in this uncertain time, we want to ease their transition back into the learning environment in a way that’s fun and engaging. We’ve made sure that the TeachMe experience can be accessed in any setting, with any device, anytime. I believe our achievements this year are a testament to how much students, teachers, and parents value learning tools that authentically combine practice and play. This year we’ve seen over 31MM users on Math Games, also part of our TeachMe product offering. With the re-launch of TypeRacer we’re also expecting to see the number of users grow 

 

Resolution Rewards: Online Health Programs Take Personal Trainer Approach

With tablets, smartphones, and "go everywhere" laptops, interactivity and situated learning opportunities are transforming courses and curricula. For degree programs in social and behaviorial health and courses dealing with personal and community health, it's now more feasible than ever to take a "personal trainer" approach, thanks to robust m-learning. This incorporates situated and experiential learning strategies. The approach is uniquely hands-on, and can include keeping a daily "change planner" that involves diet, exercise, nutrition, addiction recovery, eldercare, community health, volunteerism, and more.

Students assess their own health, or the health of individuals within their community, and they set goals. Accessing instructional materials covering text, video, and audio, together with interactive instructional materials which can include daily logs, quizzes, animations, and experiences in virtual worlds, students develop hands-on knowledge. Since they are applying the educational experience to the real world, they also can receive lasting benefits. In the case of health programs, which involve cognitive strategies and behavior modification, the course can be truly life-changing.

The advantages to the mobile personal trainer approach can be summarized:

*Encourages situated learning

*Experiential

*Engaging and "fun"

*Outcomes are applicable to real life, and they have the potential to have a long-lived impact

*Reading an e-text from the cloud (or downloaded to the tablet or an e-reader) can help reinforce the conceptual underpinnings

The textbooks that are now being incorporated into courses and curricula are being tooled to fit the devices that students use. For example, Dianne Hales's Invitation to Health (published by Cengage Learning) contains an online planner that functions much as a virtual life coach and counselor.

Serious games can often be played on mobile devices, and the experience can lead to an enhanced interaction with the strategies used in recovery. An example is "Guardian Angel," a game for health, focused on addiction recovery, developed by the RETRO Lab at the University of Central Florida's IST with SMEs from UCF College of Medicine & MUSC Dept. of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, and funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Part of the personal trainer approach involves play, which often stimulates the brain in ways that trigger pleasure centers. Knowing the connection between video game play and pleasure, researchers have looked at interactive games in conjunction with pain management. Further, there are ongoing studies designed to try to understand the best way to make interactive games truly engaging on portable devices.

Health Serious Games and Virtual Worlds: New Developments and a Few Favorites

Several new and expanded health-related virtual worlds and serious games are good reminders of ongoing advances in the way that health education, information, and collaborations are being developed and promoted. Virtual worlds are extremely effective where and when collaborations and interactions are key to obtaining information or education. In contrast, serious games are widely employed to train health professionals who need to understand concepts, analyze situations and scenarios, and respond to lifelike simulations.

Knowledge-Building with Information and Health Library Resources
Veteran's Health Administration in Second Life
http://slurl.com/secondlife/depo%20business%20hub/166/169/37/
http://www1.va.gov/HEALTH/VHAinSecondLife.asp

The Veterans Health Administration has entered Second Life, the 3-D, online virtual world to provide veterans with another means of accessing important health and benefits information. VHA has leased a virtual three-story, contemporary office building in a professional office park as part of pilot project to extend their outreach efforts.

Health Info Island
Funded by the Greater Midwest Region of the National Network/National Library of Medicine (GMR NN/NLM) through a grant written by Lori Bell, of the Alliance Library System, Illinois, librarians at Healthinfo Island in Second Life explore the provision of consumer health information services in a virtual environment. The island is home to a consumer health library and a medical library, as well as virtual outposts or displays run by the National Library of Medicine's Special Information Services, contractors for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and our newest building, the Accessibility Center. This center houses another GMR NN/NLM funded projectwith the aim of encouraging awareness of vision, mobility, learning, and other disabilities.

Cigna deploys a Second Life island for health education
With the goal of making healthcare education engaging and accessible, Cigna Healthcare has created a virtual environment in the Second Life virtual world to educate people on how to improve their health.


The Cigna Virtual Healthcare Community is an “island” in Linden Lab’s Second Life world where users can walk through 3-D interactive displays with their avatars, play educational games, listen to seminars on nutrition and health, and receive virtual health consultations.The pilot will offer virtual seminars, interactive displays and educational games that encourage preventative care, improvements in healthcare behavior, as well as help to sustain these changes.



The pilot, which will be conducted in the United States and the United Kingdom, is designed to encourage healthcare dialogue among users, healthcare providers and peers says Peter Mills, chief medical officer, Cigna Vielife Division. Mills emphasized that the program is "not replacing anything, but that people might find it a more preferable medium to engage in conversations about healthcare."


Health Care Serious Games

Pulse!! Virtual Clinical Learning Lab for Health Care Training
http://www.breakawaygames.com/serious-games/solutions/healthcare/pulse.html

Pulse!! is an effective immersive virtual learning space for training health care professionals in clinical skills. Graphics recreate a lifelike, interactive, virtual environment in which civilian and military heath care professionals practice clinical skills in order to better respond to injuries sustained during catastrophic incidents, such as combat or bioterrorism.

Pulse!! ws developed in partnership with Texas A & M University - Corpus Christi and funded from a federal grant from the Department of the Navy's Office of Naval Research.

Free Dive: Pediatric Pain Management http://www.breakawaygames.com/serious-games/solutions/healthcare/free_dive.html

Free Dive is a virtual reality-based, 3D undersea exploration adventure that invites players to swim with sea turtles and tropical fish as they hunt for hidden treasure.

The game was designed to distract children who undergo frequent and often painful medical procedures in conjunction with the medical researchers at University of Maryland Medical Center and the non-profit foundation, Believe in Tomorrow. A study involving Free Dive demonstrated that children better withstand painful medical procedures while engaged with Free Dive.

Escape from Diab
http://www.archimageonline.com/diab.cfm

Escape from Diab is a serious videogame adventure in healthy eating and exercise. The project is a production of Archimage, Inc, in collaboration with the Children’s Nutrition Research Center of Houston’s Baylor College of Medicine. Escape from Diab was funded by a grant from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institutes of Health.

Infection: Nanoswarm: Invasion from Inner Space
http://www.archimageonline.com/nanoswarm.cfm

Nanoswarm: Invasion from Inner Space is a serious videogame adventure in healthy eating and exercise. Archimage, Inc. collaborated with experts at the Children’s Nutrition Research Center of Houston’s Baylor College of Medicine. The project was funded by a grant from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institutes of Health.

New Hires Role-Play as Action Heroes in Serious Game by Enspire

Austin-based Enspire has developed a series of training courses that incorporate alternative realities and serious games for companies requiring training for distributed populations. Enspire's recent serious game / simulation allows new employees to role-play as action heroes as they learn about the company, company policies, and other necessary procedures. While serious games have been used in corporate training, the way that Enspire used game technology in new hire orientation opens a number of new possibilities, and makes one ask fundamental questions about the nature of new hires, and the "boomer to gamer" transfers of knowledge and experience.
Created for Sun Microsystems, the action-hero serious game, or, "new hire portal," was for new hires. The new-hire portal recently won Best Synchronous Learning Course at the E-learning Guild's Demofest in San Jose. Through this portal, employees can participate in social networking, read and write blog entries, and play educational onboarding computer games.

Specifically, Enspire created "Rise of the Shadow Specters," a platform game and "Dawn of the Shadow Specters," an adventure game. Both games teach Sun's core businesses and corporate culture by navigating Ray (the hero) through Sol City.


A demo is available at http://learning.sun.com/sls/staff/display/NEWHIRE/Play . Enspire’s Interactive Content Experience™ (ICE) game engine powered the experience, which was honored at the DevLearn 2007 DemoFest and featured in the Austin Business Journal.

Onboarding is a great place to incorporate serious games and role-playing because it allows people to develop a sense of community. Better than Second Life or There.com because the environment is controlled, content is official.

There are other perhaps unanticipated results of using an action-hero video game for new-hire orientation:

1---Corporate culture. The simulation provides a wonderful opportunity to introduce individuals to the corporate culture.

2--- Developing community of learners. Having a sense of a community is absolutely vital for individuals who can learn from each other and ask questions in an environment that encourages questions, support, and answers.

3--- Instructing one in procedures. Role-playing and practice are effective ways to learn.

4--- Engaging the learner, maintaining interest. Using serious games and simulations is a great way to engage the learners and keep them interested and receptive to learning.

5--- Developing a belief in the corporation that is very positive. Perception is reality, they say, and if employees perceive their employer to be very forward-thinking, caring, and innovative, it helps develop a positive belief about the company and encourages vision and mission coherence.

6--- "Boomer" to "Gamer" Knowledge and Experience Transfer. The challenge of finding ways for employees with distinct learning styles and preferences can be overcome. Specifically, "digital immigrants" of the Baby Boomer generation have an opportunity to share knowledge with the "digital natives" who grew up playing video games.

Opportunities

Managing Expectations: There is always the downside of arousing expectations, and giving the impression that the company is a lot cooler than it really is. This can be a challenge which will need to be managed very carefully, with a great deal of coordination with the Human Resources department.

Assessment Tools: What are the learners really learning? Assessment tools need to correspond with the learning style used in the original training.

Program and Training Effectiveness Evaluation: It is important to have a non-interested independent third party take a look and make sure that learning styles are being accommodated and that ADA accommodation requirements are being met. This would not be expensive, but it is invaluable. A trained instructional designer / program evaluator would be ideal. Adjustments could be made quickly and easily.

Enspire White Papers

In addition to providing custom solutions, Enspire offers white papers on games and simulations used in training. They are available at the blog: http://blog.enspire.com/

The white papers also describe how Enspire's solutions for training and professional development can be best used. The fact that Enspire offers a full suite of services is comforting. It indicates that the individuals understand the real needs of the entity and are focused on learning, rather than simply repurposing game code.

It would be very exciting if Enspire devoted an entire series of pages to assessment via simulation. This is where most serious games and simulations fall short. In courses such as conflict resolution or training, it is important to understand the underlying principles (or, in the case of a new-hire orientation, the corporate policies). The problem with most simulations and serious games is that they do not test in the same manner in which they present the original material, nor do they offer practice tests.

There are huge opportunities for serious games and simulation programmers to show how they are accommodating multiple learning styles, not just in interacting with the interface (and other avatars), but also in assessment. This is most acutely the case when learners must perform in standardized tests (licensing boards and other exams). Enspire is doing groundbreaking work and I am looking forward to more examples of their innovative use of simulation and games for training and e-learning.

Links:

New Hire Portal

http://enspire.com/