Early Learning STEM Australia

In partnership with the University of Canberra, we created two apps for the Australian Department of Education. A variety of activities are included in the apps for children and educators to engage in STEM learning. The aim is to improve outcomes in early learning centres.

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These apps focus on play, encourage active learning, and inspire children to explore and interact with nature. Two-thirds of the ELSA program takes place off-application, according to the ERA model (Experience, Represent, Apply). Instead of focusing on discrete STEM disciplines (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), ELSA apps emphasise STEM Practices: the ideas, methods, and values that underlie STEM.

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Within the apps children could do the following activities:

• Order and sequence a day experience
• String together decorations
• Sing-along and dancing exercises
• Sort healthy food items into lunchboxes
• Play hide and seek
• Explore and navigate the zoo
• Arrange books and objects on bookshelves
• Create and take photos in a playground

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We provided the following services:

• Game design and development
• Character development and art direction
• 3D art and modelling
• Animation and character rigging
• Provided print materials to extend exercises into the learning centres
• An augmented reality experience to teach spatial terms

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Within the apps activities, the following STEM topics are covered, this includes: patterns, relationships, location, and arrangement.

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Play-based activities within the apps encourage children and educators to create their own content (UGC); these reflect their lives and communities. Children's apps for ELSA are available for tablets only.

Children can play many games within each app, depending on the environment they are learning in and what's currently of interest to them. As part of our development, we also created four different characters. Each character has traits and characteristics that make them distinctive and suitable for the topics they represent.

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To teach young children STEM concepts, we developed apps. Our first app introduced the concept of understanding patterns and arrangements. Children learned this through activities that included ordering a day's activities, stringing together decorations, singing and dancing exercises, and sorting healthy food items into lunchboxes.

The app activities in ELSA by design allow kids to play and learn freely while teaching STEM concepts. Some activities allow children to play individually or in small groups. Other activities encourage play off-app as a group activity. The flexibility of content we delivered to the client enabled educators to choose activities that suited resources and requirements in the learning centre.

We had the pleasure to work with the Mode Team on the development of digital learning apps for the Early Learning STEM Australia (ELSA) program. The final products were innovative and conceptually strong, in part because they are able to establish a strong nexus between creative design and functional use.

‍Dr Tom Lowrie - Centenary Research Professor - University Of Canberra

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In the second app that we made for ELSA, we taught spatial terms, such as over, under, on top of, underneath, etc. Within the app, children could hide and seek, explore the zoo, arrange books on a bookshelf, and take photos (to comprehend viewpoints) in a playground setting. In the hide and seek activity, Augmented Reality (AR) was used appropriately to teach educational content, not as a gimmick. It allows a small group of children to play together and practise spatial terms.