Your child is using a learning app to practise division and starts getting a few questions wrong. So the app responds by giving them easier questions next. This is an example of adaptive learning. If the work is too hard, stepping back can help. And if a child is flying through it, making it harder makes sense.

But difficulty is only one reason a child might be struggling.

Maybe the explanation didn’t make sense, or they simply forgot what happened a few months earlier. Giving a child an easier question may not solve any of these problems.

Adaptive learning has been around for a while

Adaptive learning isn’t new. In its simplest form, it means changing what a student sees next based on how they are progressing. For decades, this has included things like adjusting for difficulty or moving them through different pre-determined paths.

However, technology is now making it possible for the learning experience to become more responsive. What’s changed is the ability to go beyond just adjusting difficulty and respond to what is happening while a child learns.

How Brainiac is taking adaptive learning further

This is the direction we’re building with Brainiac.

Difficulty is one of the most obvious things to adapt. But this is just the beginning. Learning doesn’t happen in a straight line, and no two children move through it in exactly the same way. A child’s learning path shouldn’t be fixed.

What really matters is whether the learning experience can adapt to the child. That might mean something they once understood has been forgotten or that a gap exists in something they learned earlier on.

We’re building learning that can draw on what has happened before and refresh concepts when they need strengthening. A child’s learning path should be shaped by their actual understanding, not just a fixed sequence of topics and lessons. That means the next step is based on what the child needs, not what comes next in the program.

If this sounds like the kind of learning you’d be interested in for your child, join the Brainiac waitlist at gobrainiac.com

Why the response needs to be different

Picture three children working through the same set of division questions. They all struggle, but for completely different reasons.

The first child understands how division works, but just needs more practice.

The second understood it before, but hasn’t used it for a while and needs a refresher.

The third is actually struggling with division because they never fully understood multiplication earlier on. So division feels much harder than it should be.

Giving all three children easier division questions might help the first. But it’s the wrong response for the other two children. The second child just needs a refresher. The third child needs to go back and strengthen multiplication before coming back to division again.

This is why the response needs to be different. On the surface, the struggle might look the same, but what’s causing it may not be.

Learning that responds

Adaptive learning shouldn’t stop at difficulty. It should be able to respond to where the child is in their learning and use that to shape what happens next.

That’s what we’re building at Brainiac. Not just a smarter way to adjust difficulty, but learning that can tell those three children apart and respond to each one accordingly.

That is where adaptive learning starts to become genuinely personal.

We’re building Brainiac, an adaptive learning platform that helps your child build understanding and confidence in maths through learning that responds to them.

Join the waitlist and be notified when we launch.

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There’s a particular kind of frustration in hearing, “I don’t remember how to do this!” Especially when you know your child could do it with ease not that long ago.

At the time, they understood fractions. They could work through it without much trouble. Then the new school term begins, and when the topic of fractions is brought up again, there’s a sudden uncertainty and hesitation.

Your reaction might be: “But you knew this”? And they probably did.

But learning something once does not always mean it’s easy to remember.

Forgetting versus Understanding

When your child learns something new for the first time, it’s quite common for it not to stick straight away. They may eventually get it and fly through their work without any trouble. But when they come back to it a few months later, they may struggle to remember how to do it again.

The same “forgetfulness” can happen to adults too. A language we once studied becomes harder to use because we don’t speak or hear it every day. A road we always traveled starts to feel foreign once we stop taking the same trip every day.

Maths works the same way. Your child might spend weeks getting comfortable with times tables in Year 3 or 4. Then the class moves on to new concepts. A few months later, when the topic of division comes up and relies on times tables, it becomes challenging. For some reason, it feels harder.

It doesn’t mean they never understood the concept. It may just mean they have forgotten because they haven’t used it for a while.

Memory fades when you stop using it

There is a well-known concept in learning called the ‘forgetting curve’. After we learn something new, our ability to recall it tends to fade if we do not use it over time. Imagine learning a new basketball play at training. At the time, you knew exactly what to do, when to move and where to move. But if you don’t run that play for a few weeks, you might struggle to remember it when the coach calls out the play.

At first, concepts like times tables are simple. Your child has been learning it in class and practicing it with homework. As they progress to new concepts and stop practicing, they may start forgetting what they did a few months ago.

This is why your child can genuinely say, “I forgot.”

But it doesn’t mean they have to start from scratch. Often, a reminder or a few probing questions can be enough for the concept to click again. It’s the “Aha” moment. What they had already learned hasn’t simply disappeared. It just needed a gentle push and reminder to get them back on track.

Consistency matters

That’s why consistency matters. Consistency doesn’t have to mean doing maths every day or repeating the same work over and over again. It can simply mean revisiting topics from time to time.

You’ve probably heard the idea of “cramming before exams”. When cramming, a child may do well, but other times they may not. But what tends to happen is that after “cramming”, the topic starts to be forgotten rather quickly. At least more so than if you had that element of consistency.

This is why a small amount of regular revision can be so useful. Every time your child revises something they’ve learned before, they are not just checking what they remember. They are helping strengthen it for the future.

Maths topics build on each other

In maths, topics build on each other, and new concepts often rely on ones previously learnt.

Children first learn about angles through shapes and basic geometry. Years later, those same ideas are built upon when they learn about trigonometry. If those earlier concepts haven’t been used or revised over time, then newer concepts can feel harder to grasp and fully understand.

Sometimes it can look like your child is struggling with something new. But the real reason they are struggling is that they have forgotten previous concepts. It’s not because they didn’t understand those previous concepts, but more that they haven’t used them recently. Remembering is part of learning too.

That is why learning cannot always be treated as a box-ticking and completion exercise. Maths topics need to be revisited from time to time.

Forgetting is part of learning

Your child can be hard on themselves when this happens. And you might feel the same frustration.

The important question is not whether your child ever forgets. They will. It’s whether the learning can be strengthened over time and be ready to support what comes next.

Next time your child says ‘I don’t remember,’ take a moment to pause. It doesn’t mean they have gone backwards.

We’re building Brainiac, an adaptive learning platform that helps your child learn maths at the right level, with lessons that adjust as they progress.

Join the waitlist and be notified when we launch.

Click here

Your child is sitting at his desk, staring at his maths homework. He’s stuck on fractions. You sit down next to him and want to help. Reading his homework, you suddenly realise you’re not really sure how to explain it.

That small feeling of guilt takes over. That moment of thinking to yourself: “I should know this” is something very common in how parents think.

Caring for your child and knowing maths are two different things

Many parents feel that if they care enough, they would be able to help with their child’s maths. So when they can’t, a sense of guilt arises. It’s as though knowing more maths reflects how much you care about your child.

But the majority of parents are not maths teachers. And caring about your child and knowing maths do not always go hand in hand. Caring is noticing when your child is frustrated or putting an arm around them when things aren’t going well. Knowing maths is being able to explain what a common denominator is, or how you do long division.

It’s quite common for these two things to feel like they are the same thing. And for parents to feel like if they can’t explain a maths concept, it means they don’t care. But no one expects parents to be able to explain trigonometry on demand like a teacher.

It gets harder as they get older, not easier

In the early years, supporting your child in maths is relatively simple. For most parents, explaining how to count, times tables or even simple fractions is manageable.

But very quickly maths becomes quite complex. Algebra gets introduced, then trigonometry and then functions. And all of a sudden what once seemed manageable in teaching your child maths, becomes all too difficult

What was something you could manage in year 3, becomes a stretch by year 9. It’s not because parents don’t want to help. But what is taught are concepts beyond what the average parent remembers, many of which are not used in everyday life.

Most parents are not walking around ready to explain algebra after dinner. That does not mean they don’t care. It actually makes them quite normal.

Being present in learning

Being present in your child’s learning environment can matter more than knowing the actual maths content.

In moments of frustration, one of the most helpful things a parent can do is not to try and explain the next steps or provide the answer. But to ask questions such as “show me what you tried to do?” or “where did you begin feeling stuck?”. This doesn’t require deep knowledge of the maths curriculum, but it does require showing up and being present.

It also helps your child try and overcome their problem long enough to understand where they are stuck. And it sends a message that matters. That being stuck does not mean they have failed, and they do not have to hide it because you are there to support them.

The pressure parents put on themselves

Many parents assume they cannot really help their child unless they understand the content and try to become teachers in their own right.

That’s the wrong trade-off. Parents may feel there are only two options. They either have to become teachers and learn the content themselves or they can “leave them to it” and take on that sense of guilt. But there’s also a third choice between these extremes. Being present is where much of the real support actually takes place.

Helping your child does not mean becoming their maths teacher. It could just mean being there when they are stuck and ensuring they know you are there to support them.

We’re building Brainiac, an adaptive learning platform that helps your child learn maths at the right level, with lessons that adjust as they progress.

Join the waitlist and be notified when we launch.

Clcik here

There’s a moment most parents are familiar with. Your child is stuck on a maths problem.You sit down to try and explain it the way it was explained to you when you were in school. But your child just stares at you with a blank look on his face.

So you try explaining it again. This time a bit slower and using a different example. All of a sudden something clicks. It instantly makes sense. You look at each other and neither of you is entirely sure what just happened.

What happened is that the explanation finally matched the way your child was thinking about the problem.

Practice helps, but only after a concept is understood

When a child struggles with a maths concept, the most common response is to give them more of it. Repetition and practice will solve it.

For some children, this can certainly work. They may be at a phase of learning where they just need practice and repetition. But for others, practicing a concept they don’t fully understand yet can only build frustration. Even if they answer questions correctly, it may simply be they are good at guessing and just trying to push through without really understanding the concept.

Practice is still an important part of learning. It can strengthen understanding that has already formed. But practice cannot build understanding if a child cannot grasp the concept in the first place.

If two children both get a question wrong, the reasons why can be different. One may be relying on a rule that only works when a question is asked a certain way. Another may have understood the concept, but struggle to recognise how it applies when the problem is framed differently.

A different explanation

Most parents have seen the moment when something finally clicks. When the same problem is reframed, it suddenly all makes sense. A slice of pizza as opposed to a fraction on a number line. Or multiplication groups instead of times tables.

This isn’t some miracle. The way something is taught can have a profound impact on how effectively a child learns. The maths concept didn’t change. It’s the framing that made the difference.

This is one part of learning that is hardest to see and deliver. Classrooms move at one speed. It is too difficult for a teacher to personalise the same example to every single child in the classroom. This isn’t a failure of teachers or schools. But it is the reality of how most learning has always been delivered.

The dimensions of ‘levels’ versus ‘framing’

When the concept of personalised learning is discussed, it usually revolves around the level of difficulty. Some children need more advanced work while others help getting the basics right. It’s like having a more advanced class for some children, or a more intermediate class that needs more time spent on the basics.

The level of difficulty matters but this is only one dimension. Two children can be at the same difficulty level and be given the same explanation of a maths concept. One might understand it while the other doesn’t. What’s happening here is that each child has a different approach to how they learn. For learning to register, some children need to see it visually, others need to hear it, while others might just need to learn by doing.

In learning, adjusting for the level of difficulty is useful, and many learning tools can do just that. But moving a child up or down the ‘difficulty ladder’ does not change the impact that framing the explanation has. A child can be on the right difficulty level, but what needs to change or adjust is how the concept is explained to them.

The impact on children

When a child is given the same explanation over and over and still does not understand, it’s rarely thought that maybe it’s the explanation that didn’t suit them. The child and/or the parent might just think: “I am just not good at this”.

That is the true impact and cost in treating every child the same. It’s not just slower progress. It’s the loss in confidence from working at something and not being able to see why the concept is not sinking in.

Confidence in maths is built slowly over time. It can be lost just as easily. And often it’s in situations where a child just needed a different way in, as opposed to more of the same.

Learning that adapts to the child

The good news is that one-size-fits learning doesn’t have to be the case forever. The future of learning isn’t just about repetition and spending more hours at the desk with more questions and more content. It’s learning that can respond more thoughtfully to the child and in a more personalised way.

Sometimes a child doesn’t need the content repeated over and over. They just need it to be delivered from a different perspective.

Every child leans differently and this isn’t new. What is changing is the possibility that learning can finally give them a different way in.

We’re building Brainiac, an adaptive learning platform that helps your child learn maths at the right level, with lessons that adjust as they progress.

Join the waitlist and be notified when we launch.

Click here

Most parents check in on maths in much the same way. Making sure homework is completed on time or looking at quiz results. Everything seems fine.

But if you have ever had that feeling of uncertainty on whether your child is progressing, you are not alone. Progress in maths is one of the hardest things to see.

Activity is easy to measure. Learning isn’t

In maths, it’s very easy to measure what a child has done, what they got right and what they got wrong. A child can complete a worksheet and achieve great results but may be relying on memory or even guesswork. Having a good memory is no doubt an important aspect of learning, but measuring understanding of maths concepts can difficult to achieve.

Learning builds on itself, which means potential gaps may stay hidden. A child might understand fractions, but struggle when percentages rely on that previous understanding. The same with multiplication when algebra is taught later on. What looks difficult with a new topic could actually be due to a gap in understanding.

Mastery in learning

Grades are useful tool to try and measure progress but it is just a snapshot. It tells you how a child performed. But does it really tell you how well they understood a concept? What grades don’t tell you is whether their understanding of the concept holds up next term or whether they can still apply the knowledge if the question is worded differently next time around.

While grades are an important indicator, it doesn’t tell you the complete picture. True understanding is being able to successfully tackle the concept when the format changes, the numbers are different, or it comes back in 2 months time.

This is what’s known as Mastery.

Mastery is when a child understands a concept well enough to not only remember it, but apply it in different ways and build upon it when learning new concepts. Without mastery, children may keep moving forward but not truly progress. Grades are easier to measure but mastery is what really matters.

Confidence is part of progress too

Confidence does not always show up on paper too, but it is one of the most reliable signs that progress is happening.

It can show up in many ways. A child who once avoided maths homework does it without being asked. A question they might have skipped gets a genuine attempt. They suddenly become more willing to give it a go with a new found confidence, not afraid of getting it wrong.

These shifts can appear before grades catch up. Confidence can often tell you more about how a child is really progressing.

Progress should feel clearer

Real progress in learning isn’t just about better grades. It’s the ability to use what has been learned, in a new situation, without having to start over again. It’s about mastering concepts and feeling confident.

Reports are useful, but most parents are not asking for more grades and numbers. They want better and clearer signals. Ones that show if their child is really progressing and mastering what they have learnt.

We’re building Brainiac, an adaptive learning platform that helps your child learn maths at the right level, with lessons that adjust as they progress.

Join the waitlist and be notified when we launch.

Click here

There’s a feeling of unease when you open a school report. A glance at the grades and comments and all seems like your child is right on track. English and Maths is tracking well and they’re a pleasure to have in the class.

Then you put it down and stare in a gaze. And you start to think that you don’t really know how they’re going.

Not in the way that helps you understand whether they are struggling in certain areas, or whether the confidence they show at home is real or not.

The grades may seem fine, but a question sits in the back of your mind. “How is my child really going?”

School reports feel incomplete

School reports were never designed to give parents the kind of visibility they are looking for. They are provided once or twice a year, based on a point in time and sometimes with a recency bias. A lot can happen in between, and much of what happens may not shows up in a report card.

A teacher cannot always capture the detail of how each student in their class is going. How each student learns best or how they might respond when they get stuck. What parents get with a school report is, at best, a point in time summary.

Consider a child who struggles with a topic like algebra. They manage to work around it, maybe by guessing and not grasping a full understanding of it. When the school report arrives they get a B- with a comment that says ‘he’s making steady progress’. Nothing seems wrong, but something feels missing.

Grades measure outcomes at a point in time, but tend to miss the process. It can tell you how they performed but not what they understood and whether they are building confidence along the way.

Gaps in learning aren’t always obvious

A child may look fine on their report card, but may be struggling on certain things.

Gaps in learning often build slowly as a child learns new concepts without fully mastering previous ones. By the time their struggles become visible in a school report, it’s actually been there for a while.

Parents usually have a strong nose for this. There’s a sense of unease that sits with them when they read a report card that seems perfectly fine. Parents want to know more but are just unsure what to ask and where to look. And the 5 minute parent-teacher interviews can often leave more questions than answers.

This is not a failure of parenting. It’s a failure of visibility.

What parents would really like to know

Most parents aren’t asking for more. They are asking for clearer visibility.

They want to know whether their child is understanding the material, not just completing it. They want to know when something isn’t clicking, and be able to do something about it before it becomes a bigger problem.

Most of all, parents want this in a way that feels useful and not overwhelming. They don’t want to become a subject matter expert and become a teacher themselves, but just want to feel informed enough to support their child.

School reports still matter. But they were never designed to tell the whole story. What’s needed are more complimentary ways for parents to get clearer visibility.

We’re building Brainiac, an adaptive learning platform that helps your child learn maths at the right level, with lessons that adjust as they progress.

Join the waitlist and be notified when we launch.

Click here

Sport used to be about competition. That was the whole point. Teams played to win, and yes someone won and someone lost. The winners were usually the ones who were more skilful, who trained harder, who understood the game better, and who put in the effort outside of match day. It was never just about showing up it was about perseverance, discipline, and pushing yourself to improve.

Becoming better meant doing the hard work: training, practising, refining your skills, and sticking with it even when it wasn’t easy.

But that doesn’t seem to be the focus anymore.

These days, it feels like competition has been replaced with an obsession for fairness, where everything has to be equal, regardless of skill, effort, age, or ability.

You see it in things like:

• Equal playing time for all players, no matter their performance

• Moving kids into easier divisions if they lose too often

• Adjusting outcomes to avoid disappointment

On the surface, it sounds positive. Who wouldn’t want things to be fair?

But I can’t help but question whether we’re actually helping kids or doing the opposite.

If we’re honest, this shift doesn’t seem to be for the kids as much as it is for the parents.

Parents today are more involved than ever, and with that comes more pressure, more complaints, and more expectations. It feels like organisations have responded by lowering the bar and smoothing out every rough edge, essentially waving the white flag and saying, “Let’s just keep everyone happy.”

But should sport be about keeping everyone happy?

Or should it be about growth?

When everything is equalised regardless of effort, what message are we sending?

We risk teaching kids that:

• Effort doesn’t really matter

• Improvement isn’t necessary

• The system will adjust itself to accommodate them

That’s not how the real world works.

In reality, effort matters. Skill matters. Discipline matters. And outcomes aren’t always equal.

When kids who work incredibly hard are given the same rewards as those who don’t, it can be demotivating. It blurs the connection between effort and achievement.

I remember hearing a story from someone who played basketball years ago. Back then, you weren’t even allowed to play inside the main gym unless you were good enough. You had to earn it.

If you weren’t there yet, you played outside. You practised. You improved. You worked your way up.

And when you finally made it, it meant something.

That sense of progression of earning your place taught valuable lessons:

• Hard work pays off

• Improvement is possible

• Achievement is something to be proud of

Watching kids today, especially when you see some just starting out alongside others who’ve put in years of effort, it’s hard not to feel like something’s off.

When everyone is rewarded the same regardless of commitment or ability, we risk removing the very thing that makes sport valuable: the opportunity to grow through challenge.

Maybe we’ve overcorrected.

Maybe in trying to protect kids from disappointment, we’re also protecting them from learning resilience, discipline, and the rewards of hard work.

This isn’t about being harsh or excluding kids. Every child should have the opportunity to participate, learn, and enjoy sport.

But participation and competition don’t have to cancel each other out.

There’s room for both:

• Encouragement and standards

• Inclusion and merit

• Support and accountability

The question is whether we’re willing to find that balance again.

Because if we don’t, we may end up raising a generation that expects outcomes to be equal, instead of understanding that equal results come from equal effort.

I experimented with different tools to put together a short course on metric units. The goal wasn’t to create the perfect video, but rather to test how easy (or hard) it is to build course material using just the curriculum details and the huge range of AI tools available.

The end result? A complete video that took no more than 45 minutes to make. The hardest part wasn’t the tech—it was imagining what the finished product should look like.

Here is the final production:

Here’s is the list of tools I used:

• Overhead phone mount from Amazon ($80)

• Eleven Labs subscription ($5) for voice-over and background music

• ChatGPT to help with content

• QuickTime for recording

• iPhone camera

• iMovie for editing

Steps

1. Idea Generation

I started by feeding the curriculum into ChatGPT and asking how it could be represented visually. After a bit of back-and-forth, I had a rough picture of what the final video might look like.

2. Rough Design

I searched online for images I could adapt into drawings for the course.

3. Preparation

Next, I set up the workspace, tidied the desk, added props like a Pikachu figure, pens, and a ruler to make the scene more engaging. I mounted the iPhone on the overhead stand and adjusted it to frame the paper properly.

4. Recording

Using QuickTime on my Mac, I connected to the iPhone camera and hit record. Having the rough design open on screen was a big help—I could simply sketch while following the draft.

5. Audio Creation

For narration, I used Eleven Labs to generate a voiceover from the ChatGPT script. I also added background music with Eleven Labs’ music generator to make it feel less flat.

6. Video Editing

Finally, I pulled everything into iMovie. The process was simple: drop in the audio and video, speed up the footage 4x, and split the audio into sections so it matched the drawings. Then it was just a matter of exporting and uploading to YouTube.

Pretty straightforward overall.

What I Learned

• Content creation is fairly simple, but traditional tools like props and editing are still needed to make it engaging.

• The style works well for younger audiences, but older students may find it a bit childish.

• AI tools massively cut production time. Things like scriptwriting and voiceover that once needed professionals can now be done in minutes.

• With just an iPhone and basic Mac tools, the whole process is surprisingly accessible.

That’s it! I’d love to hear your thoughts.

PS: For fun, I also created a Croatian version of the video to see how it might work in another language. The obvious catch: since all the drawings are in English, I’d have to recreate them entirely in Croatian to make it feel natural.

As the landscape of education rapidly evolves, more parents are turning to supplementary learning tools to ensure their children thrive academically and personally. After a series of one-on-one interviews with parents, five themes emerged. These insights not only reflect the challenges parents face today but also suggest what the next generation of learning platforms must deliver.

1. Personalisation is non-negotiable

One of the strongest takeaways from our research is that parents feel the current education system often doesn’t cater to their child’s unique needs. The demand for personalisation came up in almost every conversation. Parents want platforms that adapt to their child’s strengths, weaknesses, and pace of learning, ensuring that no child is left behind and no child is held back.

This was especially true for families with neurodiverse learners, such as children with ADHD, autism, or dyslexia. Many parents shared that traditional teaching methods leave their children feeling frustrated or disengaged, which can impact academic outcomes and self-esteem. They expressed a desire for tools that can provide multiple pathways to understanding, including audio, visual and interactive content. By tailoring learning experiences to individual needs, education platforms can not only boost results but also build confidence in learning.

2. AI can unlock new opportunities

Artificial intelligence was a topic parents were curious and hopeful about. Many see its potential to transform the way their children learn. They imagine a tool that can identify knowledge gaps instantly, recommend topics and exercises in real time, and adapt lessons to a child’s unique learning style. Parents talked about how AI could become like a personal coach where they are always there, always ready, and always patient.

One idea that excited parents was voice interaction with AI platforms. Instead of just reading instructions on a screen, what if children could talk to their learning companion, ask questions in their own words, and receive explanations that feel natural and conversational. For younger learners especially, this kind of interaction could make learning engaging, almost like having a friendly teacher in the room whenever they need help.

Parents also shared that AI could relieve a pressure point they often feel. Not knowing exactly how to best support their child at home. With AI-driven insights, recommendations, and even voice-based guidance, they would feel more equipped to guide their child’s learning without needing to become the tutor themselves.

3. Convenience and Flexibility drive adoption

Modern families are busier than ever, and one of the strongest themes from our interviews was the need for flexibility. Parents described balancing school schedules, extracurricular activities, and family commitments, often leaving little time for structured tutoring. As a result, they want supplementary platforms that fit seamlessly into their daily lives rather than adding another source of stress.

Features like self-paced modules, mobile-friendly lessons, and the ability to learn anytime and anywhere were frequently highlighted. Parents also valued the option to adjust lesson length, from short, bite-sized sessions on busy days to longer deep dives when time allows. For many, this flexibility was not just a convenience but a necessity for maintaining balance in the household.

4. Engagement must go beyond the Textbook

It was clear that parents want learning to be more than just ‘rote memorisation’. Many expressed frustration that their children often find school boring or demotivating. The desire for learning platforms to spark curiosity and make learning enjoyable was universal.

Gamification came up repeatedly. Parents shared that integrating gaming elements to a learning platform could help engage their children more, especially if their friends were using it as well. Others pointed to the value of interactive problem-solving and real-world applications that show how academic concepts are useful outside the classroom.

Importantly, while many parents highlighted the importance of staying aligned with the school curriculum, they want learning platforms to go a step further. They are looking for learning that incorporates practical life skills, such as money management, digital literacy, and teamwork, which they feel are often missing in traditional schooling. Parents believe that blending core academic subjects with these real-world life skills can equip their children to navigate life more confidently.

The message was clear: when learning combines curriculum mastery with practical knowledge, children are more engaged and better prepared for the future.

5. Seeing progress builds confidence

Parents want reassurance that their efforts, and their child’s efforts, are paying off. That’s why progress tracking was one of the things that was most frequently brought up. They don’t just want to know whether their child got today’s questions right; they want to see a bigger picture: how skills are building over time, where their child is excelling, and where extra help might be needed.

A common frustration parents shared is only finding out about a problem too long after it’s taken place. That’s why real-time updates are so important. Instead of waiting for a test result weeks later or the School report card 3 months later, parents want immediate insights into how their child is doing. This kind of instant feedback helps families step in quickly with encouragement or extra support before challenges turn into setbacks.

Detailed dashboards, progress notifications, and easy-to-understand reports give parents confidence that their child is on the right track. They also make it easier to celebrate wins along the way, whether that’s mastering multiplication tables or finally cracking a tricky essay.

Closing Thoughts

The message from parents is clear: they’re not just looking for more content, they’re looking for learning that truly works for their child. That means education that is personalised, powered by smart technology , flexible enough to fit into everyday life, deeply engaging, and backed by meaningful real-time feedback.

Ultimately, families want their children to feel confident, curious, and supported. It’s not just about being prepared for the next test, but to be equipped for a lifelong of learning. The challenge is to create a seamless experience that brings all of this to life, and the opportunity is truly transformative.

Conventional startup wisdom says: ship fast, validate, iterate. And while I get the value in that approach (especially when you’re finding product-market fit) - my 30 years of software engineering experience keep pulling me in a slightly different direction.

I just can’t bring myself to launch something on top of a brittle foundation. It’s not that I disagree with moving fast, I just don’t believe speed should come at the cost of stability.

There are parts of every software system that are always the same, no matter the use-case. And when you skip those “boring” bits, you will feel the pain later - especially when real customers start using your product.

I’m talking about things like error handling, logging, observability, traceability, authentication and authorisation management, transaction management, project structure, CI/CD pipelines, and a proper dev/prod environment setup. These are the things that no one brags about, but they’re what let you build fast later without everything falling apart.

That’s what we’re doing right now with Brainiac.

Before writing a single line of domain logic, we’re getting the foundation rock solid: architecture, infrastructure, and tooling. These aren’t just nice-to-haves; they’re the backbone of any reliable product.

I’ve been on the other side of my previous business. We got some of it right and it paid off massively. But some things we overlooked (logging and observability especially), and it caused serious pain. Having customers tell you something’s broken before you even know about it - is an embarrassing position I never want to be in again.

To the startups and founders reading this - here’s what I recommend you nail before building features:

• Design a clean, modular project architecture

• Set up proper error handling and logging from day one

• Configure observability and traceability (yes, including logs and metrics)

• Build your first CI/CD pipeline — even a basic one makes a big difference

• Put in place a solid unit and API testing framework

• Implement user registration and authentication

• Add role-based authorisation management early

• Set up both development and production environments properly

• Establish consistent API standards and structure

• Create a simple system to manage offline or async work (you’ll thank yourself later)

• Write database scripts to reset and rebuild your DB on demand (clean slates are powerful)

With all of this in place, we’ve created a stable, testable, observable, and deployable base that lets us now dedicate all of our focus on real product features.

Yes, it’s a slower start. But once the groundwork is done, we can move with speed and confidence - no firefighting, no rewrites, no embarrassing surprises. Plus, if we need to change things or pivot, we can do this knowing we will always have a solid base to build upon. Having a solid foundation will also enable us to onboard new engineers seamlessly, catch issues early, and deploy frequently without breaking things.

Some might say this approach goes against the lean startup grain. Maybe. But to me, this is lean - we’re removing waste later by investing smartly now. Once this foundation is set, we can be truly agile - iterating on the product itself, not scrambling to patch broken plumbing.

So if you're starting something new, think about your foundation. Don’t skip the boring bits - they’re what make the exciting stuff possible.

Here I am again, pen in hand, staring at a blank piece of paper. What will I build next? How will I leave a positive impact on this planet? How can I push myself to achieve even more than the previous venture? What can I do that genuinely needs to be done?

Somehow, whether by destiny or fate, I find myself drawn once again to a common theme: leveraging software to make the world fairer, to give everyone equal opportunity to succeed – not just the ones who can afford it.

This time, my target is education.

I have witnessed first-hand the growing divide in the quality and delivery of education. The ones with money can afford to send their children to private schools, pay for tuition, and provide them experiences that others can only dream about. As for the rest, they are playing a lottery with much higher odds against them – left to the declining public education system that struggles to appropriately fund schools and teachers, giving tomorrow’s adults that one extra challenge in life.

I don’t believe that quality education is something that only the fortunate should be able to afford.

But it’s not just the money that’s the issue, it’s the system – the way we teach has also fallen behind. Although technology has made significant leaps and bounds, the fundamental structure of teaching and classrooms has mostly remained the same. Schools are driven by curriculums, national tests, and conformity.

The teacher, like a conductor in an orchestra, stands in front guiding their pupils to the same pace, same tune, and song. If you play too slow, you must work harder to catch up to the rest, and if you play too fast – you must learn to slow down and be patient.

Somehow, the current state of education believes that we are all the same - drones made in a factory, each with the same operating system, built to the same specification.

But this is not who we are. We are human. We have individual thoughts, individual desires and passions, and our own unique lens on the world.

An effective education system would see this, and ensure that learning is uniquely adapted to each individual – one that can understand the individual’s state of learning and dynamically adjust their path to what will be most effective for them. A system that recognises the unique needs of the individual and is able to guide them at their own pace.

We call this personalised learning.

It’s with these primary objectives – making quality education accessible to everyone and ensuring that education is tailored to the individual – that I have decided to dedicate the next chapter of my life to building a business that is able to accomplish these goals.

It’s called Brainiac.