TAK-TAK-TAK: educational video games and pedagogical tools

Education is the pillar for societies’ development, unfortunately socio-economically disadvantaged students are more likely to not access quality education.The baseline level of proficiency is required to participate in society.

Inoma devised a free innovative system that changes these students’ lives bringing together technology and fun to conduct the best in education. The TAK-TAK-TAK System consists of educational video games for children and a platform where parents and teachers can learn about digital tools for teaching and their children’s progress to work on their weaknesses. This lets teachers know which video games can be integrated in their teaching plan to reinforce weak concepts in their groups.

Children worldwide can access our video games through our online and offline solutions and learn while developing technological skills which represent better job opportunities, social mobility, reduction of the digital gap and therefore, participation in society which guarantees an increase in life quality.

Socio-economically disadvantaged students across OECD countries are more likely than  advantaged students not to attain the baseline level of proficiency (almost three times in science). In the case of Mexico, the 78% of the 5.23 million students that were finishing elementary school in 2015 had insufficient skills in Math, and the 82% in Spanish (PISA).  This results are highly disturbing because a deficient basic education predestinates a limited participation and social mobility.

One cause of the problem is that most disadvantaged schools don’t have access to digital educational tools that allow students to familiarize with the use of ICT generating a digital gap. Other cause is that their teachers are not supported and trained accordingly to the 21st century necessities producing deteriorated educational plans that a lack of updated content. This deficiencies cause the students scare motivation for studying and low opportunities to reduce their economic vulnerability.

Inoma focuses on those causes, seeking to develop digital skills in teachers so they can teach 21st century competencies through technological educational materials and to motivate and reinforce their students knowledge and skills. Inoma also developed technological solutions (USB and Server) to solve the lack of connectivity, recurrent in many communities. 

To carry out a face-to-face intervention, Inoma looks for low resources communities and conducts an ethnographic study to learn about their problems, causes, and needs. Inoma deploys TAK-TAK-TAK system mostly in schools, adapting the intervention to their needs and the teachers´ digital competences. First, Inoma shows them the benefit of integrating TTT system in their teaching planning. Then, throughout the school year, they integrate a pedagogical strategy adapted to their needs and knowledge. Inoma's pedagogical team develop their strategy or, in case we have already developed one according to their needs, we use it. 

Through labtak.mx they would access the strategy and follow up their students’ progress through activity reports. The intervention focuses on the appropriation of the system for a subsequent replication, independently of our intervention. In the following years they would develop their own strategy based on video games. That is why the implementation’s objective is also to strengthen their capacity of creating pedagogical strategies based on digital tools. 

With the integration of TAK-TAK-TAK, students learn through fun educational video games reinforcing their competences, knowledge, and digital and socio-emotional skills . TAK-TAK-TAK offers personalized learning according to their knowledge and skills through predictive algorithms in all subjects.

The TAK-TAK-TAK system, based on educational video games, allows children to learn through them and teacher and parents to teach. TAK-TAK-TAK video games include subjects such as: Math, Reading, Grammar, Spelling, Science, Values, Economic inclusion, and Arts, they also reinforce socio-emotional and digital skills. Over the last 6 years, 100 video games (27 available as apps) have been developed and are accessible through a free internet page (www.taktaktak.com), apps or through offline solutions (Tak USB and Tak-Server). LabTak (www.labtak.mx), a platform created specially for parents and teachers, offers them educational plans and teaching strategies for personalized and effective learning according to their  students’ needs.

Each community can decide the pedagogical strategies that work best within their planning and solve the particular needs that concern them. They serve as a basis for the development of personalized pedagogical strategies, so the system is renewed depending on the context and the needs of the populations served. In the short term, better education is achieved; in the long term, less economic and social inequality.

The video games have been developed based on the full basic education curriculum (K-9, with initial focus on K-6), consistent with most national curricula, the American Common Core and the XXI Century Skills defined by the UNESCO. They also fit the curricula of the Mexican Ministry of Education. 

Fun is the essence of TAK-TAK-TAK while it supports, reinforces and complements the traditional elementary school. It allows tracking of player activity, and customizes the site to individual user’s needs and learning progress. 

Through LabTak, teachers and parents learn about their child’s performance through reports, which provide real-time statistics regarding individual player’s progress. Reports let them know their strengths and weaknesses, which lets them guide their teaching according to each children’s needs.

Inoma is aware of the connectivity problems that institutions might have in different communities, which is why we develop offline alternatives such as Tak-Server and Tak-USB so that these people can have a semi-connected or offline experience. This way, more people can experiment with our playful-educational tools regardless of their connectivity situation.

Additionally, Inoma offers schools: setting up of the media classroom for the use of taktaktak.com and labtak.mx, training for teachers and representatives of media classrooms in the use of the TAK-TAK-TAK system, a telephone and mail of contact to solve problems concerning the TAK-TAK-TAK System and the sites, and periodic technical-pedagogical visits.

The TAK-TAK-TAK (TTT) system approaches the lack and quality of innovative educational content for children with low resources in Mexico and the world. We make our system innovative by offering offline solutions (Tak-Server and Tak-USB), which lets children under any connectivity situation have an offline experience with our free educational video games. This project gives children the opportunity to improve their knowledge, abilities and competition. Unlike other ludic platform, TTT offers personalized learning with predictive algorithms in subjects (Spanish, Math, History, Ethics, among others) and with individualized feedback for parents and teachers.  

On the other hand, Labtak is a digital tool that allows teachers to choose and develop a pedagogical strategy based on digital content such as TAK-TAK-TAK educational video games. They can chose the one that best fit on their groups depending on the particularities of their students to trigger or detonate knowledge, reaffirm concepts, extrapolate, motivate, learn how to learn, among others. With personalized reports they can know the strengths and weaknesses of each child in order to create a plan that best fits their group’s needs. 

Our technological solution allows us to address the challenges of education since our different developments allows children from anywhere in the world to play and learn through TTT video games. The TTT system is integral: it contributes to the development in academic, digital and socio-emotional skills that will allow kids to work and improve for their community while strengthening abilities and competencies that are fundamental to their human and sustainable development.

The TAK-TAK-TAK System can benefit thousands of children, parents and teachers through the use of computers, tablets, mobile applications, as well as USB and servers that don’t require internet. It consists in two cycles. First, the child enters www.taktaktak.com, registers and plays some of our 100 educational video games. The data generated is kept in our database. The intrinsic characteristics of each video game allow children to advance at their own pace, generating personalized learning.

The second cycle consists in support and feedback tools for parents and teachers stored in LabTak (www.labtak.mx) were the content of each video game is explained, so that they can use them in their basic education teachings. With the information kept in the database, reports are generated (ReporTak) where you can consult the use that each player, group, school or region gives the video game and the improvement in concepts, themes and subjects that our video games cover. 

Both sites integrate technology, fun, personalization, community and provide huge benefits of different kinds at a very low cost.  Each community is free to decide the pedagogical strategies that work best within their planning and solving the particular needs that concern them. Groups and communities serve as a basis for the development of personalized pedagogical strategies, so the system is renewed depending on the context and the needs of the populations served. In the short term, better education is achieved; in the long term, less economic and social inequality.

Educational inequality leads to deepening economic differences and reduces social mobility. Mexico is within the 25% of the countries with the highest levels of inequality in the world, and has a poorly effective educational system.  

However, a good quality education in the first years of life generates sufficient knowledge to advance to the next educational levels. This way young students ensure more educational years with better learning, which in the long term allows them to aspire to a better life quality in their community. 

Pedagogical research established a high correlation between fun and learning, and that technology helps the development of digital, socio-emotional and educational skills. That’s why TAK-TAK-TAK brings together fun and technology to create an attractive and personalized solution for children. When students play at TAK-TAK-TAK, a short term benefit is that they develop cognitive skills, as well as 21st century competencies. This impact was verified with an independent statistical test applied to 17,000 children in Puebla, Mexico; showing an improvement of 0.18 standard deviations in academic performance in standardized tests.

The evaluations displayed showed that learning achievement through video games is maximized when there’s teacher intervention. That’s why teachers also benefit from using LabTak, while adapting to XXI century necessities and integrating the use of ICT in their teaching methods.

Inoma seeks to provide greater opportunities for children and reduce the educational and technological gap. These actions, in the long term, will lead to less economic inequality as a result in educational improvement.

Currently we have reached 542,451 children in TAK-TAK-TAK, 16,335 teachers and / or parents registered in LabTak and have developed 100 video games. 

By 2019 we have set out to reach 600,000 children in TAK-TAK-TAK, 17,000 teachers and / or parents registered in LabTak and 110 educational video games.

By 2023  we have set out to reach  to 1 million children in TAK-TAK-TAK, 30 thousand teachers and / or parents registered in LabTak and have 200 educational video games developed.

In a first cycle, Inoma created the TTT educational video games. However, evaluations showed that learning achievement through video games is maximized when there is teacher’s intervention. That’s why, in a second cycle, LabTak site was created to support teachers with pedagogical content to integrate TAK-TAK-TAK in their teaching. In a third cycle we seeked to create a deeper integration of video games in teacher planning. Therefore, we develop teaching strategies that incorporate the use of TAK-TAK-TAK video games with other activities in their planing. This new version of LabTak allows teachers to develop their own teaching strategies according to their students’, community’s and learning environment’s (school, library, homeschooling) needs. This way, significant learning is developed using a game-based teaching system.

By 2020, LabTak will integrate new functions to create a teaching community which will nourish thanks parents’ and teachers’ interaction and feedback: doubts, achievements and their own teaching strategies. It will be a space for communication and learning, enriching content and creating a deeper learning among teachers and parents. 

In the following five years we will reach a million users in TAK-TAK-TAK, 30, 000 in LabTak and develop the rest necessary video games to complete the elementary school curriculum (200 as a whole).  Also, we will finish adapting the video games for apps and translating them to English to continue our worldwide expansion and be sustainable. LabTak will cover 100% of the concepts and skills with own developed strategies and will have more strategies created by the consolidated community. 

1.Risks in the development and adaptation of the educational video games: that it doesn't teach the educational concept well; that it doesn't entertain and isn't accepted; programming errors that harm the user’s experience. 

2.Technological challenges: new operating systems or actualizations in them and in internet browsers that could not support the video game.

3.Finishing the alliance with the SEP (Mexican Ministry of Education): if this happens, it will difficult  our goal of benefiting half a million users in three years.

4.The lack of connectivity in Mexico and in most of developing countries. 

5.Economic difficulties: the country's situation apparently entails NGOs to lack of donations, we developed a business plan in order to continue the deployment and development.

6. The deployment of the system out of Mexico complicates the possibility of having feedback and face-to-face support for the integration and appropriation of the System. as well as help to solve connectivity problems, pedagogical advice, analysis of community problems, among others.

7. If we want to deploy the System in countries where the native language of children is not Spanish, we have to translate all the video games, sites and supports to English. This can be very expensive and complicated,

8. When we work in other countries (now it is the case of the deployment in the refugee camps), we are at the expense of the decisions of that country, as well as of its internal and foreign policy, in which we have no interference.

1. Advised by each area´s experts (pedagogical, recreational, technological, etc.) we have methodologies that verify each video game’s “game flow” is respected to avoid/decrease these risks. We constantly evaluate the video games and platforms to make sure they have the desired quality and effectiveness.

2. We work with the original developers and/or internally in order to adapt the video games to new operating systems, browsers or actualizations. Our programmers take this into considerations to develop compatible video games.

3. We diversified our strategy to increase our alliances and reach our goal. The Mexican Ministry of Education has helped us reach many schools around the country, but if for any reason this alliance is broken, we have been increasing our collaborations with other organizations to continue helping children in public schools.

4. Internet connectivity has been and is still a big challenge for us. But Inoma has developed offline alternatives so teachers and students can enjoy the benefits of the TAK-TAK-TAK system: Tak- USB and servers.

5. We are updating our business plan in order to be economically self sufficient without depending on grants or donations. This way, we reduce the economic risk and continue to develop our games and System’s deployment. 

6. Online and offline strategies are being developed so problems due to geographical distance don’t affect the system’s implementation. 

7. An interdisciplinary team is in charge of achieving the adaptations of all games and pedagogical resources to English language. 

8. We seek to maintain relations with international organizations and work within a framework of legality.

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• Research and Data analysis: 3 full-time workers and 1 social service student. 

• Technology and websites: 2 full-time workers and 2 social service students.

• Education: 1 full-time worker and 1 social service student.

• Video games: 1 full-time worker.

• Deployment: 4 full-time workers and 1 social service student.

• Institutional Development: 2 full-time workers and 4 social service students.

• Administration and Legal: 2 full-time workers and 2 social service students. 

• General coordinator: 1 full-time worker.

• Managing Director: 1 full-time worker.

Inoma 's philosophy is to integrate experts in each activity so we can have a great product. All of Inoma ́s collaborators are leaders of the projects but at the same time they work with very well prepared suppliers. This work flow promotes lower costs and lets us achieve our goals by making the organization profitable. Inoma is formed by 17 committed and experienced collaborators who coordinate, manage and deploy the projects of the TAK-TAK-TAK system in different areas and communities. The development and maintenance of the platforms of the project are carried out by a group of experts in technology, video games and education, in a way that the system is always reinventing itself and adapting to the current technological and pedagogical challenges. External institutions constantly verify our contents to make sure we have the highest quality standards so that every decision taken leads to the best outcome possible. 

We have ten years of experience and several international awards and acknowledgements, such as: best mobile content in Learning and Education for the World Summit Award contest, Audience Choice in Scale by Creator Awards Mexico from We Work, Honorable Mention for TAK-TAK-TAK Science Video Games by Science in Action, finalists in the WISE Awards 2018, regional winner of Latin America for being an innovative project aimed at improving results of students learning by Reimagine Education and finalists in the E-Learning category also by Reimagine Education.

Partnerships lets us take the video games to new communities or develop new content: 

• Ministry of Education in Mexico: part of the educational curricula, which lets us reach more children and teachers

• CIYOTA Organization: the alliance allowed TAK-TAK-TAK system enter Coburwas Primary School, within a refugee camp in Uganda. 

• Koinonia Educational Centre: the alliance opened the doors to TAK-TAK-TAK system to this school in a marginal area of Nairobi, Kenya.

• OFUNAM (Philharmonic Orchestra of the National Autonomous University of Mexico): together we created a Music education program through video games to raise awareness and bring children closer to music.

• Universia- Santander Foundation and CIDE: we implemented the Tak-Talentum Project to detect exceptional talent in Math, Raven Test and verbal abilities, in young people through the use of video games. 

• Gentera Foundation: we implemented financial education course for children in Mazahua indigenous communities. Due to its success, it was implemented in more schools in the community and benefited more children

• Gonzalo Río Arronte Foundation: we implemented two TAK-TAK-TAK video games to help students in the Mazahua indigenous community develop their social-emotional skills, make decisions in risk situations, as well as decisions related to the consumption of substances harmful to health.

Our direct beneficiaries are children of the bottom of the pyramid and their teachers and parents. We offer free personalized platforms for children (TTT) and for teachers and parents (LabTak). Our mission is to develop academic, digital and socio-emotional skills through fun and technology. We have carried out internal and external evaluations of our products and the results show that TTT video games are an efficient instrument for learning because the game represents the main learning source in each human's first years. Along with this, the global context demands the use of ICT in the educational ambit because a student that  relate to technology can, consequently, re adapt constantly, relate with his environment and be a part of a society based in the role of digital technologies.

Our intervention model has achieved in the teachers the development of digital skills and the development of pedagogical DGBL strategies ad hoc for their specific needs, that impact their students in the current year and their next students. By doing this, our vision is to diminish social and economic vulnerability to decrease poverty and to promote sustainable development and better quality of life, in or out of their community. 

To achieve this social change we work hand in hand with educational and/or local authorities and with our partners, donors and suppliers. As an NGO, our platforms are free to our beneficiaries and our revenue is mainly from donations but we combined our business model with recovery fees to be economically sustainable.

As we are an NGO, we have been funded primarily by donations from public and private institutions, with which we have been able to reach our goals to date. Apart from donations, our business plan includes the collection of recovery fees from:

• Direct sales to private educational institutions providing them educational guides, teacher training, progress reports, and technical check-ups of media classrooms. Inoma began this year and the product/services demand is high.

• Direct sales to public educational institutions. We are part of a national strategy in Mexico where public schools can buy official educational services. We became part of the official content in Colombia where public schools can use our platforms (the first international strategy in our business plan).

• Collaborations with Mexican Ministries of Education at state level who finance our activities locally.

• Direct sales through our platforms (with organic users), still in development. We are looking for investors through startup funds and venture capital.

Currently we are investing resources to translate all our products and services to English, with the aim to expand to US Latino Market and English speaking countries and other scenarios, such as refugee camps (we are now in Kenya and Uganda). This way we may reduce the economic risk and continue our developments and the System’s deployment as planned. 

We have created an effective and efficient educational product that has been tested and used primarily in Mexico. We are convinced that this educational solution can impact millions of communities on the planet. For that reason, we are looking to make partnerships with MIT Solver network of professionals to improve our product’s areas of opportunity, strengthen it to have an effective and efficient scalability and expansion in English speaking countries and in other scenarios, such as refugee camps. Also, we want to have ve access to MIT Solver funding, media and conference exposure, and technological mentorship, as one of the main pillars of this project is technology.

From the beginning, Inoma has worked with the philosophy of being integrators and has achieved more than 100 alliances with different sectors (private, public and education, technology, etc.). However, we consider it fundamental to build these alliances with the international community as well, and we would love to be part of the MIT Solver network because they are committed, open-minded and are the best in technological matters.

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Inoma's partnerships' goals are to grow, expand and sustain our projects. Alliances with UNICEF and UNESCO could help develop video games where children learn about their rights, the environment and climate change; contributing to build knowledge societies. Inoma would also like to partner with the Ministry of Education and Sports of Uganda as well as the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology of the Government of Kenya in order to implement the TAK-TAK-TAK System in more schools than Inoma already have impact, so that they can reinforce their knowledge and have the possibility of aspiring to better living conditions. We would also like to work for refugee children who drop out of school and are prone to poor academic development. An alliance with UNHCR, could help implement our video games in the refugee camps; allowing them not to abandon their studies and reinforcing their knowledge.

A partnership with Google Stadia and with Microsoft’s digital store of Windows 10 could help us offer our video games in a more accessible way and to strengthen the platform and its deployment.

MIT’s network of professionals could help improve the areas of opportunity of our product through research and innovation.

With this prize we would continue the growth, expansion, and sustainability: 

Growth: the grant will support the creation of new educational plans and teaching strategies in different modalities (websites, offline solutions and applications) this allows the system to unfold more easily and favors the integration of TTT System and the creation of a community.

Currently we have pedagogical strategies that cover 30% of the  concepts and skills defined to cover by TTT System. With the award we could developed new pedagogical strategies to cover the 70%. They will be focused on the integration of the TTT System in the classroom, outside of school scenarios and in refugee camps.

One of the main keys for the adoption, use and permanence of the TTT system is the variety and flexibility of its content and pedagogical resources, by increasing the strategies we are promoting greater growth, permanence and, therefore, greater transformation and impact on our beneficiaries and communities. In the short term, better education is achieved; in the long term, less economic and social inequality. 

Sustainability and expansion: we seek support from mentors to be known by international stakeholders such as schools, professors, investors and donors that can help us in the process of expanding to Latin America, English speaking countries, refugee camps, and US Latino Market. This way, more children and teachers can benefit from this noble tool and we can fulfill our purpose of reaching more than 30,000 teachers and 1 million children around the world by 2023.