(D) Battery down?

Ask students to show you this screen when they have completed their session, before they log out.

This Session Completed screen is a feature, not a bug.

Slamming through these facts at the rate of 3 seconds apiece (or less as they go faster) is very INTENSE.

Students will do this game for a couple of hours at a time if you let them. But here’s the problem.  They will only do it for a couple of days, and then they will just wear out.  They just won’t want to do it anymore.  We don’t want them to lose their enthusiasm, so…….

After ten minutes of play, up comes the Session Completed screen.  Here is the script for what Mission Control says to the student:

Mission Control here. Great work, astronaut!  You have completed your session.  Show this screen to your teacher or parent to prove it, before you log out.  You have worked hard and deserve a break to go do something else.  Don’t try to do Rocket Math for at least an hour.  Mission Control signing off. 

Log back in too soon and get the battery down screen.

The system will not let them in unless they take at least a 20-minute break.  If they log back in too soon, they will see the battery down screen. The game will not start again until this countdown is finished.  They should log out and go do something else, rather than sit and wait for the time to end.

We want students to do a little practice a couple of times a day but spaced out over a month or two.  The longer it takes for them to get through an operation, (the longer this is spaced out) the longer they will retain the information.  And they need to know these facts for a lifetime!  So, a little bit each day is far better than sitting down for long periods of time until they are sick of it.

We purposely planned for your students to end a session anxious to play again.

Yes, they may complain that they have to stop, but that ensures that they will want to come back again later.  You want them to end their sessions just dying to play more.  That’s how you can get them to play and practice, time after time, day after day until they reach Level Z.  That’s how we win and that’s how they win!

Remember, you want them to practice at home also, which they won’t do if they are getting sick of it.  You want them to practice the whole time they are assigned to do it–and they won’t do that if they aren’t motivated to keep going.  That’s why it ends after ten minutes of play.