When experienced finance professional Shohreh Blank worried that her mental arithmetic ability was fading in a world dominated by calculators and computer shortcuts, she discovered a gap in the education market.
The UK is in the midst of a mathematics crisis with pupils struggling to pass the GCSE and thousands turning away from the subject even if they do make the grade.
The result is a fun, new app that stimulates interest in numeracy and promotes understanding of the basic principles that drive mathematics.
“I’m really concerned at the levels of ability and interest in maths. It seems like we have allowed it to become something that is tough to learn, and even harder to find any enjoyment through,” said Dr Blank, from Swiss Cottage, who spent four years developing the app called cZeus Maths Challenger.
“We desperately need to change attitudes and culture so that maths becomes trendy. It is a huge shame that people feel discouraged and not motivated. To promote a call for changing attitude in the society, I set out to create an engaging and entertaining app to practice mental arithmetic whilst developing a better understanding of the underlying maths.”
“This app is based on a unique concept – players pick up the skills without realising it because they are having so much fun with the game which has animated figures from mythology and takes players through levels up to Olympian and Titan”.
The game is available to download on IOS and Android. Its structured layers gamify maths theory and promote logic, numeracy and memory skills in a puzzle aimed at players aged from 9 to 99.
Dr Blank, who worked as a senior financial quantitative analyst and strategist for blue chip companies, developed her love of maths at school and went on to complete a PhD in applied mathematics before establishing a career in finance.
“Like most other kids, when I was introduced to maths, I felt scared and thought that I could never learn it. But with perseverance, maths became easy and very enjoyable. Like any new challenge, maths could initially feel daunting, but one has to feel the fear and do it anyway,” she says. “Sadly, a lot of people are put off by maths at school and it remains something they never go back to, even though it is so important in life. That fear of maths can also be passed through generations, so it is important to break that cycle.”
Research has highlighted declining standards in maths at school levels and a recent revised GCSE curriculum has been blamed for turning pupils away from studying maths at A-Level.
Poor numeracy skills also affect national economic performance with studies claiming that the UK economy loses £20 billion a year from basic mathematical errors.
“Maths is not only useful for managing financial matters in life like mortgages, credit cards and bills, but also is one of the best brain training exercises to keep you sharp,” adds Dr Blank.
“Nowadays with smart devices around, it is very easy to be lazy and not to practice mental arithmetic. We then eventually lose the ability. I always used maths logic in my career, but certain things like memory of my times-table gradually faded away. I felt that was very embarrassing, and decided to brush up my memory, but the conventional way didn’t appeal to me. I was a Sudoku player at the time and decided to find an engaging game or puzzle that could engage my numeracy, similar to crosswords and Scrabble for languages. Unfortunately, I could not find any game that was stimulating enough and at the same time could extensively practice times table.
“I strongly believe that shortcomings in maths skills are a result of the lack of opportunities for practice and fun in a social environment. No-one wants to go back to their school times tables. It was astonishing that there was nothing out there that had a fun, absorbing element built into it and be useful for any age group”.
Dr Blank decided in her spare time to create a new puzzle that would encompass logic, numeracy and memory all in one.
Once she set the concept and created the principle of cZeus puzzle, she commissioned her trusted friend Dr Manoocher Azmoodeh to develop a core software that could generate thousands of such puzzles in a matter of minutes.
“Our next task was to make a fun and user friendly app that could assist players in an entertaining way to solve these puzzles,” she says.
“I am proud of what we have achieved and I have taken it slowly because I didn’t want to sell out to a big investor and have to compromise on how the game functioned,” she adds. “This is about making maths fun again and switching people onto a subject they have dismissed.
“People of all ages will enjoy playing the game and won’t even notice that they are using techniques such as factorisation and algebra as they progress through the levels.
“It will make people more comfortable with maths and numbers and have a positive benefit for society which is one of my main motivations. I want this to help make maths trendy.”
The game, which has a multi-player function and in-game advertising to generate revenue, has been tested on students at Imperial College London who gave it a positive feedback.
Jon Greenman, former maths professor at Stirling University, added: “cZeus is a thoroughly absorbing game based on a smart idea and has the potential to take the player further along the path to a deeper appreciation and enjoyment of mathematics.”
The app has been developed in line with the UK national curriculum requirements and can be used to reinforce classroom learning and encourage numeracy play.
Theoretical Computer Science Emeritus Professor Ray Turner of the University o f Essex has endorsed the app.
He said: “This is a great way to get the interest of a wider range of people with no formal mathematical training in such an important discipline. cZeus is more powerful than other brain training games as it teaches a real-life skill and has the potential to play an important role in changing the cultural attitudes towards maths education in general.”