Chapter checks

Nobody has to take it. Skipping it locks nothing, and every chapter stays open whether or not the check before it was passed.

It answers one question for you: has this actually stuck? A child can follow a lesson perfectly while it is in front of them and still not have it a week later. The chapter check tells you which of the two you are looking at.

1. The first screen says how many questions there are (most checks have 8 to 15) and how many right answers a pass needs, such as 12 of 15. Tap Start the check.
2. Questions come one at a time and mix the chapter up rather than going lesson by lesson. Each sitting draws a fresh set in a fresh order, and the answer choices are shuffled every time, so a check cannot be passed by remembering where the right answer sat.
3. A check can be left part way. Each answer is saved on this device as it is given, and coming back shows Carry on: question 3 of 15, or Start again for a fresh sitting.
4. The first answer is the answer. There is no retrying a question during the test, and no right or wrong shown until the end. Tap Next question, and Finish after the last one.
5. There is no timer, and the score is never shown part-way through.

A number answer that can be below zero has a +/− key, because a phone keypad has no minus sign. In math, Scratch paper is there while the questions are being asked.

Most questions carry two hints. Need a hint? opens the first, and Show another hint the second. No hint gives the answer away.

The screen says plainly what a hint costs before the child opens one: an answer given after a hint shows as Right, with help and does not count toward passing. A pass is meant to say the child could do it alone. Using a hint is still the right call for a child who is stuck — it turns a guess into something learned.

1. Passed or Not yet, with the score out of the number asked. Answers given with a hint are counted separately underneath.
2. On a Not yet, the screen says how many right answers a pass needs and lists Practice these first: the lessons the missed questions, or the ones that needed a hint, came from. Each is a link with the lesson’s name, and the main button, Practice lesson 1, opens the first of them. Try again is still there beside it.
3. Show all lists every question with your child’s answer, the right answer and, under Why, how to get there. Each is marked Right, Right, with help or Not yet. It only appears after the test, never during it.
4. After a pass, Start followed by the next chapter’s name opens that chapter in the course list. Try again starts a new sitting straight away, as often as you like. Back to lessons returns to this chapter.

That is useful information, not a failure. Open Show all together and read the Why lines, then go back to the lessons under Practice these first. Lessons can be repeated as often as you like, and the parts your child moves behave differently each time.

Open All courses in the menu, pick a course, then a chapter. The chapter’s screen lists its lessons, with a Chapter 1 check button (numbered for that chapter) underneath.

It is also the next step from the chapter’s last lesson: the button at the foot of that lesson reads Chapter check instead of Next lesson.