Order Types
Brightling offers various order types to tailor the learning experience to each child’s needs
Ordered Mode: Presents cards in a top down order.
Random/Shuffle Mode: Mixes the cards to provide variety and keep the learning process engaging.
Reinforcement Mode: Focuses on reinforcing the material that the child needs the most help with, based on their performance.
Decks
Brightling offers a variety of educational decks designed with a minimalist style to ensure children remain focused and free from distractions. Each deck is crafted to enhance specific areas of rote memorization, providing a comprehensive learning experience. The following decks will be available at launch: Letters, Numbers, Shapes, Colors, Plants, Animals, Foods, Transportation, and Emotions.
Child Mode
Brightling’s Child Mode is designed to create a safe and engaging learning environment by restricting access to the app’s data and settings. This prevents children from inadvertently removing themselves from the account or deleting the account entirely. In Child Mode, children can select from available decks and navigate through cards using only the previous and next buttons. Instead of attempting to score their responses, the app reads the card aloud, allowing children to see and hear the content without affecting their progression data.
The usage data from Child Mode—such as favorite decks and frequently revisited cards—helps us to develop more sophisticated learning pathways and reinforcement behaviors. This ensures a tailored learning experience that adapts to each child’s preferences and needs.
Child Progress Screens
Parents can track their child’s progress with detailed average data for each deck. The time slider feature allows parents to look back and see their child’s development over time. Additionally, percentile scores per deck and a broader cumulative score on the main progress screen help parents understand their child’s standing among peers, with the aim of guiding further learning activities.
Philosophy
At Brightling, we believe in child-led learning. If a child shows signs of fatigue or distress, it’s crucial to stop the activity to maintain a positive attitude towards learning. Children form mental pathways during their formative years, which later develop into more sophisticated networks. Therefore, learning should always be light-spirited and fun, driven by curiosity. Overbearing approaches can snuff out a child’s natural curiosity, which is why activities should stop when the child becomes disinterested. We recommend starting as early as two years old, or as soon as the child can reliably repeat sounds, to set the foundation for a lifetime of learning.
It’s also important for parents to approach the data provided by Brightling with an objective mindset. This data can sometimes be emotionally triggering if specific results are expected. However, it’s essential to view this information as just data—a tool to understand your child’s growing brain patterns and development. Percentile statistics are intended to provide objective insights into your child’s performance in specific activities compared to their peers. Intelligence and future success cannot be fully assessed through these simple metrics.
Remember, the goal is to make learning enjoyable and frequent. By using Brightling in a fun and engaging way, you help form strong mental pathways and strengthen the bond between you and your child. The emphasis should always be on creating positive learning experiences rather than judging or pressuring the child based on their performance data.
Intent
Brightling aims to answer key questions about early childhood education. We don’t yet know the optimal times for children to start learning shapes, numbers, or letters, but with Brightling, we will gather the data needed to find out. By linking app usage data to developmental issues such as color blindness, dyslexia, and more. Parents who opt into our longitudinal data program will receive questionnaires when their children are ages 5, 7, and 10. The answers will enrich our datasets and help identify statistical probabilities of developmental issues. This information can then be presented to parents of children exhibiting similar usage patterns, offering early insights and support.
