How AI helped to become the leading online English learning school for kids in Europe. Novakid case

Online learning is a fertile ground for digitalization. Our portfolio company Novakid shares its story about the specifics of using a data-driven approach and artificial intelligence in EdTech.

Spoiler: at the end of the article you will find some secret news for our friends who have 4–12 year-old children!

Artificial intelligence will soon learn to recognize even facial expressions

Before the launch of Novakid, Maxim Azarov, its founder and CEO, had long been fascinated by the idea of a “teacher-bot”. He wanted to create a program that would conduct a lesson according to a set plan, track the student’s actions, and adjust the lesson to his needs.

However, he had to abandon this concept. The fact is that the children, especially during their first lessons with a teacher, use many non-verbal ways of communication, such as gestures and facial expressions. Creating such a “teacher” would require too many resources and too much data.

So Maxim went the other way — he created a platform that, with the help of virtual reality and gamification technologies, provides deep immersion of children in the process of mastering the language. It uses the massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) model, whereby the students interact with each other and earn personal “achievements”, and the teachers act as moderators.

1,500 parameters for student progress assessment

Parametric analysis allows to get an extremely accurate assessment of the child’s knowledge. The machine-learning-based system individually measures each student’s progress.

The analysis is conducted using 1,500 so-called micro-skills. Even the smallest variables are taken into account. For example, how well the child has mastered a particular grammatical structure, whether he/she often forgets words, pauses in his speech. This level of identification of strengths and weaknesses cannot be achieved with teachers and standard 5-point, or even 10-point, grading scales.

However, it is worth mentioning that Novakid teachers are also involved in the grading process. It happens after the student has completed a certain number of lessons. Depending on the assessment of competences (Speaking, Reading, Grammar, etc.), the child may be assigned additional lessons.

The fundamental difference from traditional learning is that the fairness of all grades given by the teacher is controlled by a system based on machine learning. Why is this important? Firstly, the teacher is also a human being who can make mistakes (e.g. assign extra lessons or lose sight of the need to tighten some competences). Secondly, the child may be in a bad mood, or just be tired. Finally, the teacher may be replaced. Sometimes it also affects the behavior of the student during the lesson (some of the children instantly adapt to a new teacher, and others need more time to establish a trusting contact). AI neutralizes external factors and eliminates possible inaccuracies in the assessment.

Personalizing the program and maximizing efficiency

Parametric analysis in knowledge assessment allows Novakid to make the training program as personalized as possible. After all, behind every textbook there are people, and no one has yet canceled the subjectivity of the author’s position. At Novakid, the program can literally be changed after each lesson or block of lessons.

Data-driven approach helps to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the student. The system can modify the curriculum depending on the needs of the child. And then, if necessary, change it again, and again, until the unique combination of lessons that suits that particular student is found. As a result, children may need a different number of lessons for one course. But both the company and the parents always have a clear understanding that the child has perfectly mastered the program, and not just “attended” the required number of lessons.

Personalized approach helps to adjust the content of the lessons, choose and rank the exercises depending on which ones prove to be the most effective for a particular student.

Helping the teacher and no subjectivity

Have you ever had a grade at school that seemed unfair? Novakid solved that problem. However, data-driven approach helps Novakid teachers not only in grading. Thanks to AI, the teacher can fully focus on the main thing — the teaching process itself, on how to captivate the child and hold his interest.

Technology helps teachers to get rid of the routine

The system itself reminds the teacher where the lesson ended last time and suggests what to pay attention to, whether to ask the student more questions, encourage him to talk more, etc. By the way, thanks largely to this system, Novakid teachers can easily substitute for each other. The need to “tie” a child to a particular teacher is nothing more than a myth. On the contrary, Novakid recommends a parent to choose at least two regular teachers. That way the student can take the best from each of them. At the same time, the quality of learning does not suffer at all.

Evaluation of emotions and successful screenshot

From a technical point of view, assessing the student’s emotions and psychological state is one of the most difficult tasks. There are plenty of opportunities for experiments and growth here. For example, Novakid engineers have already taught the platform to automatically select the most auspicious moment in the course of the lesson to take a photo of the student. In the future, such photos can be used, for example, for publication in social networks.

Introduction of facial and voice biometric elements into the system helps to read the student’s emotions during the lesson, to understand at what moments of the lesson he/she was bored, and at what moments he/she showed maximum enthusiasm. Of course, you could also ask the child himself whether he/she likes English lessons. But the answer, especially when it comes to young children, may not always correspond to reality.

The child may say “yes” because, in his mind, this is the answer his parents expect from him. And in reality he/she will be burdened with the lessons.

Or he/she might say “no”, but only because he/she succumbed to a momentary emotion. But the child’s interest is the key to successful language acquisition. That is why it is so important for an English school to understand whether the student is really interested in the lesson. Analysis of emotions also allows to determine how suitable a particular teacher is for a child. It also contributes to the quality of learning.

Novakid engineers still have a lot of work to do in the field of video and voice recognition and analysis. Improving this area is one of the main tasks of Novakid for 2021, but we can already say that these technologies are the key to sustainable growth and expansion of the company in 35+ countries. Active growth, international expansion and customer service allowed Novakid to lead the ranking of online English language schools for children in Europe, according to a June 2021 study by J’son & Partners Consulting. It also entered the GSV Edtech 150 rating, which includes the most promising Edtech companies in the world.

Novakid Coupon Code for our readers

We usually leave our contacts at the end of the articles so that the founders of startups can send us their pitch decks, but today we decided to prepare a little gift for the readers and share a coupon for any first purchase in Novakid. Using the promo code LETAVC20, you can get a -20% discount on one or more classes — use the product and evaluate for yourself whether AI works:)