Students will soon have a more interactive and engaging way to learn the fundamentals of cell biology.
University of Minnesota startup Andamio Games has partnered with Sehoya Cotner, Ph.D., professor with the College of Biological Sciences, and Barbara Billington, Ph.D., professor of STEM education with the College of Education and Human Development, to develop a tablet-based educational game to teach the concepts of cell respiration and photosynthesis. The project, funded by a $150,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, will conduct pilot tests of the game at classrooms this summer and ultimately provide the game to schools across the country free of charge.
Andamio Games, launched in summer 2015 and based in Minneapolis, creates interactive games that help educators in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields teach core concepts to students through individualized learning and collaborative problem solving.
The company’s first game was iNeuron, developed by Janet Dubinsky, Ph.D., neuroscience professor with the U’s Medical School, to make brain science more accessible. Both K-12 classrooms and the general public have used the game to increase understanding of normal nervous system functions, along with drug interactions, mental health and neurological disorders.
See the CBS blog article for more on Andamio’s upcoming educational biology game.
Over the past two years, the University’s Office for Technology Commercialization has licensed three separate research programs into app-based startup companies, translating the programs into products and services while creating jobs in the regional economy.