Homeschooling mums are amazed at new learn-to-read game
Vilde Randgaard / December 6, 2019
Homeschooling mothers have found a new favorite tool for helping their children learn how to read. Amongst them are Vicky, Charleen and Abigail, who have spent two months testing the new innovative game, Poio by Kahoot!, with their children, and below they tell us what makes them love it!
Poio by Kahoot! is a learn-to-read game for children aged 3-8 years. It recently won the award for Best Learning Game 2019, and is designed so that children learn through their own exploration, triggering their curiosity and motivation to practice without the need for support. It continuously adapts to the individual child's level of skill, providing a steady sense of mastery.
Charleen: “He loves the independence!”
Charleen is an ESL teacher and mum who homeschools her three little children. One of them is five-year-old Robert, who she has tested out Poio with. Here’s what she thinks of the game:
Every day after doing all our classes Robert wants to get on his tablet and play Poio!
He previously wanted to use games that had reading stuff but a lot of them needed me to help him and he did not like that. So the best part is that Poio was done by Robert 99.9% of the time. I love that part. I never help him unless there is a technical issue. He loves the independence.
He finished the game once and now is on his second time. He loves the game and all he has to do to get the words for the book. It’s great to have a game he likes that is only enforcing what he learns in class with me.
Hearing all the sounds throughout the game helps him so much. It keeps him saying all the sounds and he keeps trying to read everything!
Robert (5) is well on his way to becoming a skilled reader. Photo: Private
Vicky: “I’m amazed at the difference it’s made to my daughter!”
Vicky homeschools her four-year-old daughter Annabelle, and their recent use of Poio has truly made an impact:
Thank you so much for creating this!
I’m amazed at the difference it’s made to my daughter, she’s sounding out words and reading! She’s just 4 years old! We’ve been telling all our friends about it because we are so impressed.
It’s so easy to pick up and play, the characters are adorable and the repetition of sounds means my girl picked up the letters so quickly.
It gently eased into sounding out the words and in no time my girl was sounding out loud alongside the app.
These words then forming a story is just a beautiful touch and gives my daughter more fuel to play because she wants to continue Poio’s adventure story and find out what happens next.
Since using the app, she has now been sounding out words she spots in real life and reading them.
It’s so nice to have found an app that feels like play to her, but that I can see is actually teaching her something.
I wish this had been around years back when I was teaching my son to read (that was long and difficult). This app has made my job of teaching her reading so much easier, it’s made it fun!
Annabelle (4) playing Poio while her mother Vicky is watching her progress. Photo: Private.
Abigail: “He asks to play Poio, instead of watching a movie”
Abigail has been using Poio with her four-year-old. This is what she says about the game:
He did know some letters before Poio. Maybe like 4 that he regularly recognized, but that is it. And definitely only uppercase, but now he recognizes some in both upper and lowercase, which I love.
I love watching him play and really love that more and more often he asks for his iPad to play Poio instead of watching a movie!
He loves the characters and listening to the reading of Poio’s story. He does want me to play with him sometimes, but most of the time he wants me (or his Dad) to watch HIM play - which I love!
Overall, I think it has definitely helped him learn more letters and sounds in the time he has played. Learning his letters and picking up the sounds is a huge step in the right direction to me!
Definitely happy with his progress from the game!
Give your child the best possible start to their reading journey! Download Poio by Kahoot! today.
