Technology has changed the way we do everything. How we communicate, how we experience the world and even how we learn. Markezy is a digital platform that allows educators to create and grade assessments for students. And never has the need for such a functional tool been this high. With remote education picking up pace and even replacing offline schools in some cases, the other parts of education too have to move online.

Unlike physical assessments, digital ones are quick, convenient and far more precise. And with digital assessments educators can ensure the students are tested and well checked on their abilities and knowledge even with remote learning.

Ease of use

One of the primary advantages of Digital assessments is the ease of use. Being digitized the assessment can be created, reviewed and graded, whenever and wherever convenient to the educator. The digitization also ensures that all tests are accounted for and fairly graded. Another benefit of having digitized assessments is completely eliminating paperwork. As done in several industries across the world, reducing paper usage is not only a need but a responsibility to be carried out by organizations. Digitizing thus is a much greener option and helps eliminate the cumbersome paperwork.

Accuracy

Digitization naturally also makes the scoring of the assessments accurate and easy. The computerized process evaluates based on parameters designed by the educator themselves, thus allowing a great deal of modularity.

Various test patterns

With the digital way educators can also include various types of scoring methods with ease. Multiple choice questions, matching, fill in the blank and more. This range of test patterns enables an overall assessment from the scores, which is calculated automatically. The automatic calculation takes away the possibility of wrong grading and scores, thus making the digital assessment far more accurate than regular ones.

Simplicity

Educators across the world have been adopting digitized assessments due to their nature of being simple and direct. With countries like the UK, USA and UAE adopting technology into education, digitization is the easiest and most effective solution forward.

Improved learning outcomes for students

As beneficial for the educators, digitized assessments are great help to learners as well. They improve learning outcomes by delivering accurate scores on subjects and assessments types that allow for a fair judgement and analysis of students’ knowledge in the subject. The students are better able to improve on sections of the course they lagged behind on, by receiving feedback from the assessments. This feedback being objective, allows them to take measures and get better at subjects and programs altogether.

Convenience of review for student

Digitization also makes sure that all course work is in a single place and preserved like it should be. Having access to the entire semester’s worth of work and assignments gives the learner a wider perspective into their course program, and also helps them keep track of their performance and understanding level, thereby promoting self-study and improvement habits. The online portfolio also gives the student a deeper understanding of the course they are in, which helps them achieve the desired goals through it.

Object insights for students

Another plus side of having digital assessments is that it provides the learner with specific insights into their performance in the curriculum. The feedback received by the learner helps them improve in specific terms and adds a great deal of modularity in the learning process. The insights since based on individual performance are created only to cater to the student, making the experience personalized as well.

As similar to the educator, the learners have access to the assessment and feedback anytime and anywhere they like. This gives the learner an opportunity to improve their performance and create a better learning experience. Quality of learning is also improved with unbiased and objective feedback that in turn improves the quality of education.

Markezy with its tech-based assessments and transformative analytics makes online learning or remote learning as effective, if not more than, the standard education practices. Improving one online assessment after another with usable and functional tools, Markezy aims at making the education experience better in places where remote learning is already on the rise, such as North- America, the Middle East and Asia Pacific

Contact us

We have heard the saying; practice makes a man perfect. In early childhood years, ongoing repetition is the foundation for learning. Repetition helps to improves confidence, reinforces learning, and increases the fluency of the child.

At the preschool stage, students learn to speak, read and write. Educators and parents must take every opportunity to develop the child’s language skills in order to help him communicate his thoughts & feelings better.

Complementing preschool studies with fun & games at home is one of the most effective ways of practicing letter sounds, words, syllabus, and much more.

No matter what time of the day it is, your little one will never refuse a game or two. Enlisted here are simple early literacy games that you can design for your children at home without much hassle and get started right away!

Flip Over Cards

Select about five to ten words from a book that your child has just read on the Kutubee app. Write down each word on a piece of card paper and arrange them neatly in a row with the word hidden under. The child flips two cards and reads the words on them. He decides whether the words match or are they different. Continue this activity until the child finds a pair to each of the words. This game is great to boost memory power and improve recognition of word skills.

Sort as per the Letter Sounds

Choose a few letter sounds and write them down on separate flashcards. Write down 5 words along with its corresponding picture, to match each letter sound. Jumble the flashcards and ask the child to sort the words that belong to a particular letter sound. This increases the child’s phonemic awareness as he places an ‘arrow’ card under the /a/ sound.

Rhyming Word Game

Rhyming is an important skill to master for reading. Words like ‘cat’, ‘pat’ and ‘rat’ or ‘cook’, ‘look’ and ‘hook’ can be identified under one rhyming family. The parent can use scrabble pieces and arrange them to form a word. The rhyming sound can be separated from the rest of the word by spacing the pieces of scrabble blocks. For example: J – UMP | L- UMP | B – UMP or L – OVE | D- OVE | GL – OVE. The child follows the pattern and constructs similar words that fall under the word families. This activity will positively lead to reading and writing success. You can also use fill in the blank sentences, such as; The __ is fat. The child fills the blank with rhyming words like ‘cat’ or ‘rat’.

Syllable Counting Game

Syllables are nothing but breaking down the word into ‘chunks’ to help the child pronounce the word correctly and later spell it appropriately. Display a few words from a storybook he has just read on the Kutubee app on a whiteboard and ask the child to break it up as per the syllable. Some words have only one syllable and others may have up to three in them. The words ‘took’ and ‘book’ are examples of single syllable. While words such as; ‘banana’ – ‘ba/na/na’ or ‘bicycle’ – ‘bi/cy/cle’ have three syllables. Play a clapping game with your child and clap out every syllable in the word. In the word ‘picnic’, clap once on ‘pic’ and then clap again while pronouncing ‘nic’. Once the child gains confidence, ask him to look around, shout out words and count the syllables by playing the clapping game.

Magic Letter Tracing

Anything that appears and disappears is magic! How about a letter appearing and disappearing in a tray full of ‘magic sand’? This makes for a great pre-writing activity. The toddler takes a while to develop the ‘pincer grip’ by which he can hold a crayon or a pencil in hand. These fine motor skills slowly start evolving as the child practices writing ‘letters’ in sand or salt and then running a finger over it multiple times to practice the pattern.

So, are you ready to utilize your little one’s energy and leverage it by making ‘play time’ a fun-filled learning experience?

Contact us

Being in middle school means learning to become more confident and mature individuals. Most middle schoolers are between the ages of 11 to 15 years and would be in sixth, seventh or eighth grades. These young adults are constantly growing, each at their own pace, both physically and emotionally.

There are certain skills that a middle school grader is expected to develop to ready themselves for the complexities of the 21^st century world. Some of the cognitive milestones that are achievable in this age bracket are:

• Improved decision-making skills
• Enhanced reasoning capacity
• Effective problem-solving
• power Constructive creativity

Tapping the developmental skills of a middle school students

Incorporating the STEAM system of learning, Lego® Education introduces the SPIKE™ Prime Set which is go-to kit for every 6th to 8th grader. Students always seek newer opportunities and learning techniques to sharpen their skills. It is every educator’s prerogative to provide ample hands-on project-work opportunities to encourage the students to use their creativity and imagination.

The classroom is like a playground where the foundation of a great future is anchored. When the playground is powered by the right tools such as the SPIKE™ Prime Set, it develops a pathway for correct attitudes and behaviors needed to be successful individuals in future.

Brining Ingenuity to Classrooms

Ingenuity means being clever and original. We are aware that products which are innovative, sell faster in the market. So why not ask our young adults to be inventive and design their own product solutions by using the LEGO® Education SPIKE™ Prime Set.

With every unboxing, students discover a whole array of possibilities with the multipurpose LEGO® bricks, easy programmable features, multi-port hub, and simple drag-drop coding language based on Scratch.

Put on your dancing shoes and get ready for a dance-off. Something as cool as a dancing robot can be built from basics in merely a 45-minute session by the students from the SPIKE™ Prime Set.

If you think being a parent you have the right to mess with your teen’s belongings, you might want to think again. These mighty geniuses are busy constructing their own ‘safety vault’ and it’s almost impossible to crack-open the treasure by figuring-out the correct ‘secret code’.

By getting an opportunity to design, code, and market products, teens learn to think critically, analyze data, and solve complex problems with real world relevance.

The All In One Box

The SPIKE™ Prime Set comes in an attractive box which comprises the following hardware and software:

Programmable Smart Hub

At the heart of the SPIKE™ Prime system comes a brick shaped programmable smart hub with rechargeable battery life. It is powered with 6 input/output ports, 5×5 light matrix, Bluetooth connectivity, a speaker, and 6-axis gyro.

Highly accurate Motors and Sensors

Children get together and brainstorm on what model of robot, or which dynamic device, do they wish to curate with the help of high-quality motors and sensors accompanied by the colorful LEGO building elements.

New Elements Added

The new and improved set includes 500 vividly colorful LEGO Technic elements. The 3×3 frame is an excellent spacing element and permits a smooth change in the direction of the build, such that students spend less time constructing and more time learning.

Storage Box and Sorting Trays

Wise men say, there is a place for everything and everything must be in its place. To keep each component of the SPIKE™ Prime Set safe in its allocated place, the kit comes with a sturdy storage box and sorting trays, so that one doesn’t have to play a game of hide-and-seek just before starting with the project.

Making the right start

• Students learn to code with an easy drag-and-drop coding feature based on the Scratch programming language, used by millions of children around the world.
• Effective STEAM learning is incorporated in a 45-minute session, with focus on Engineering and Computer Science.
• The essentials debugging is important for the success of any project. Students learn to fix the bug and move ahead with the planned strategy without hesitation.

The well-structured online lesson plans and interactive support materials, aid educators to deliver planned lessons to students. Learn more about SPIKE™ Prime Set and order your first set delivered to your doorstep in Dubai and all over the Middle East.

Contact us

What do you think Geography is? Is it the study of maps? Or is it where you’re taught which water body is called what? While it is both those things, Geography is much more. It is the study and understanding of lands, seas, features, and even people and their interlinking cultures and relationships. Simplified, it is the study of a planet, with all its layers and aspects included.

Why teach Geography?

In various grades the student would be taught various things about the planet we live on and the planets around us. At a younger age the student would be introduced to the concept of the Globe, a place common to us all and the ways it exists. With increasing grades, students move up to exciting phenomena like weather, topography and culture. Here’s where Geography takes a turn into the social science that it is known as. And the understanding of the subject is important because it gives you a perspective! History gives us lessons to learn from, Physics gives us an understanding of why things happen, and Geography is what quantifies all of it. How big is the world, how does the weather change, how do the sea waves work, how are cultures different, what kind of food do people eat, all of these questions are answered by Geography.

Teaching Geography in early childhood

Clearly with such vast and varied concepts, Geography should be an advanced subject, right? Wrong! Geography gives us the understanding of the world we live in and who needs that the most? You guessed it! Young children. Learning about the world they live in, animals and environments and very importantly cultures.

Culture and its understanding in Geography

Like the way art is a form of expression for individuals, culture is the way a society expresses itself. Culture defines how the people live, what the people eat, and why they engage in the activities that they do. Since culture changes with regions it is often attributed to a region like topography or climate. Building this link and understanding in early childhood, ensures that the student builds on a fuller understanding of the world they live in.

Picture Books for Geography

How do you teach a child anything? By making it fun! And looking at beautiful pictures and drawings is definitely fun for the children, as is stimulating for their minds. Books although seem like a tool of the past, picture books are still as relevant in this time of technology. And here’s why:

Great to look at

Getting the obvious out of the way, picture books are great to look at! Majestic landscapes, interesting diagrams, visual cues to all ideas. They just add an entire dimension to the information in the book.

Easy to follow

The books with pictures tend to have a higher completion rate. You know why? Because they’re not intimidating. The illustrations and images can make the most complex ideas look like simple facts. This also helps the reader retain most of what they’ve read.

Interesting

Picture books are built to add interesting visual representations of ideas presented so they can clearly communicate the concept or the information. For example; it’s great to hear that Mount Everest is the tallest mountain in the world but a diagram comparing it with the world’s tallest buildings seems far more interesting, right?

KutuBee is an interactive platform built to achieve this for the young readers of the new generation. Containing more than 1,500 books KutuBee is set out to use the wonder of picture books with Technology. The books in languages such as English, Arabic and French enjoy a great young audience in the Middle East, especially so in urban regions of Dubai, Abu Dhabi and so on. The books are online renditions of the best of Arabic and International publishing. Bringing the delight of reading with imagination to the young generation.

Contact us

Mathematics is not engaging for a lot of learners and this is specifically the case for young students. Learning with theory and books proves mundane for young students and games are the solution! How? The Gamification of Mathematics. Games have become a very common part of culture in the young and for due reason. Games are stimulants. It is a way for a person to experience something without having had even left a room. Entire story lines and narratives are created through games. Here is how bringing them to Mathematics helps.

The primary purpose of any game is to let the player enjoy and engage in an activity that leads to winning. Math curriculums tend to be heavily leaning towards traditional academic ways of instruction. Therefore, teaching mathematics with games has taken such precedence in recent times, where teaching students with application is the gold standard of education. Games provide the perfect platform to the students to be able to apply their concepts and learnings.

Due to the nature of the subject, learning Mathematics is commonly an intense activity that involves a lot of time and patience. Through games, since students learn to apply their concepts and use them, the learning experience becomes far more meaningful.

Making Math Studies a Rewarding Experience

Motivation is another positive attribute that comes from teaching with games. Games are inherently designed to bring about a certain degree of competitive spirit, while also providing the player with a tangible goal to meet. Translating this mindset into teaching Mathematics brings about such attributes of gaming to the student’s learning experience.

The nature of gaming itself helps students with taking the stress away from learning Math. As opposed to traditional ways of teaching Math, games allow the students to step away from the formal way of learning. This enables them to learn with application and understanding.

Mathletics emerging curriculum blends the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation factors to provide gamified learning experience to keep the students engaged in the subject.

Health Competition without any Complication

Games also make it easier for the student to build up on their skills steadily, while choosing their levels of understanding and applications. This also allows for students to work with their own personal levels of understanding while also learning from other students in the activities. This tackles on a common complaint from students about Math, that it’s too complicated. There are no complications in games, right? It is only a challenge!

Re-attempting to Level-up the Game

The repetitive nature of Mathematics also benefits from games since it gears the learners to try again even after they have been unsuccessful on a ‘level’. This results in students making multiple tries, whereas they could have simply forfeited in case of a regular mathematical problem. Building a resistance to trial fatigue is also something games do very well. Flappy bird a game from 2013, is a great example of this. Players will repeatedly try to win a game that was unwinnable! That is the kind of spirit gaming brings to Mathematics!

While being a great tool to teach, games also allow students to bring about independence in their learning. Independent thought and understanding of concepts go a long way for students which is applicable not just for Mathematics. It is a skill that is useful for the students in all kinds of learning and in life. It allows them to think for themselves and find a solution to their problems.

Skills Development at its Best

Other benefits of gamification of mathematics include helping the student develop skills such as strategic thinking, problem solving & application. Theory learning is not able to facilitate such an effective way to learn, because of how the human brain works. Students learn with experience and trial, which is exactly what games can create.

Mathematics is generally associated with other ‘boring’ activities by students and gamification has a serious potential to change that. Bringing in games to Math not only makes it less of an intimidating activity, but also makes it a fun process for the student. Helping them build a foundation of concepts with the help of real-world, tangible applications. Teaching Math with games also helps eliminate a phenomenon in students referred to as ‘Math anxiety’. With its truly engaging and accessible nature Math games enable students to not be intimidated by concepts of Mathematics, since it is a game anyway, right?

Contact us

Most schools and play centers stress on teaching children the ‘phonemic sounds’ of the letters before introducing them to the letter names. Well, are you confused? Did you know English language has 44 unique sounds, despite there being only 26 letters in the alphabet (A-Z). Each of the 26 letters have a dedicated sound and some sounds are produced by the combination of two letters.

What is phonics?

Phonics is the most effective way of teaching preschool children to read and then learn to write. It helps children comprehend words and distinguish one word from the other. The goal of teaching phonics is to help children correlate the sound to the spelling so that the word can be decoded easily. Knowledge about phonics will also help children identify which letters to use while forming the written words.

Being able to read the words correctly, increases the child’s reading fluency. He is more confident and no more struggles with the printed words he sees in a book or on screen. Even if an unfamiliar word which the child has never read before is presented to him, he is able to apply the rules of phonics and read it correctly.

How early can a child start learning phonics?

Usually children begin learning phonics as soon as they say goodbye to their toddlerhood age. A three to four-year-old is quite equipped to start his journey into phonetic expressions and rhymes.

To begin with, a lot of action songs are introduced to the child.

For example: See me play on the drum. Playing drums is lots of fun, with a /d/-/d/-/d/-/d/-/d/-/d/-/d/-/d/-/d/. See me play upon the drum!

In this song, the child pretends to hold ‘drum sticks’ and bang the imaginary drum to make the /d/-/d/-/d/ sound.

Fun activities for children to learn Phonics

You know what the best part about teaching phonics is? There is no rule book or a paper and pencil way of learning letter sounds. Educators and parents can be as creative as they want. Children can sing, interact, dance, and read to learn by play-way method while having lots of fun with their fellow learners. Here are a few interesting ideas to teach phonics to young children:

Online Phonics Game

ReadingEggs presents unique online games to develop a strong foundation of phonetic awareness amongst your little champs. ‘Fast Phonics’ gives them access to over a hundred highly interactive phonics games to boost letter-sound recognition skills from /a/ to /z/ and beyond.

This programme has 20-fun-filled levels and each level is represented as a ‘mountain peak’. Children gradually climb each mountain with every passing challenge in a systematic manner and get rewarded for it. There are a dozen of animated videos, printable worksheets, and fun-activities to enhance the child’s reading skills.

I-Spy Game

This is a very common game played to memorize association between the sounds and the words. From the magic box objects are made to appear one-by-one and the children have to guess the sound by which the object begins with. For example: show a ‘ring’ and children relate the /r/ sound to the object.

Dr. Seuss Books/Poems

Children love Dr. Seuss books for their very attractive illustrations and simple short stories. Some of the books you might already be familiar with are; ‘The Cat in The Hat’, ‘Fox in Socks’ and ‘Hop on Pop’. Do you notice a pattern in all the titles? Yes, they all rhyme. Read these to your children at bedtime or during the day to familiarize them with rhyming words and ask them to think of other words that rhyme to test their vocab.

Design a Phonics Wall

Set aside a corner in the classroom or your home to display a set of CVC (consonant – vowel- consonant) words and leave a blank for any one letter. Let children decide for themselves as to which ‘letter sound’ is missing and encourage them to fill in the blank. Once you think the child has mastered these set of words, change them and introduce another batch. This is simple, fun, and as children see it around them over and over again, they become better readers.

Contact us