The Firefly app was developed by a multidisciplinary team of researchers from the Universities of Grenoble Alpes, Paris 8, Lyon 2, and INSA Lyon. It has been scientifically validated with several hundred CP and CE1 students from mainland France and overseas. Firefly is a game targeting oral comprehension in English for cycle 2 students. It covers lexical and cultural objectives, as well as grammatical and phonological ones.

Firefly was designed as a journey combining numerous mini-games integrated into a narrative. The story encourages student motivation by inviting them to join an international spy team to save animals. The narrative also provides a cultural anchor. Children hear and act on increasingly complex statements in English, repeated by different characters.

Firefly was designed as a tool to help cycle 2 teachers integrate English lessons into their classroom practice.

How does Firefly work?

In Firefly, children play as apprentice spies who must complete various missions. The story takes them from their native Alps to the British Isles. During their travels, the main character meets native speakers from different English-speaking regions. They are thus exposed to various varieties of English, strengthening the player's listening skills.

The overall goal of the game is to free animals that have been kidnapped by "bad guys." To achieve this, the main character must complete activities that allow them to develop their English listening skills. Children learn words on various themes (colors, numbers, clothing, actions, shapes, emotions, etc.), without forgetting a cultural dimension (the geography of the British Isles, London's monuments, etc.). Firefly offers nine missions, representing over a hundred activities.

A Scientifically Validated Application

Experiments were conducted in numerous CP and CE1 classes in the Grenoble, French Guiana, and Mayotte schools. In the latest study, a first group of students used Firefly (307 students) and an active control group used another educational French reading application (332 students). The results show that:

- Students using Firefly made more progress in English than those in the control group.

- For two students with the same baseline score, the student using Firefly performed approximately 12% better than a student following a traditional program.

- This result holds true regardless of the students' starting level.

- Progress occurred not only in understanding isolated words, but also in understanding sentences.

The results of the latest study corroborate the findings of previous studies.

Firefly allows students to progress in English while having fun and working independently.

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Credits to the Firefly research team: https://luciole.science/Crédits

Link to the popular scientific publication: https://fondamentapps.com/wp-content/uploads/fondamentapps-synthese-firefly.pdf

Scientific article forthcoming

To test Firefly, go here: https://fondamentapps.com/#contact