Today’s blog is another review of a times tables app. I’ve already reviewed Math Ninja, which ended with an overall rating of 20/30 and 10 Minutes A Day which scored 24/30. Today I’ll be reviewing TimesTablesHero.
TimesTablesHero Review
Cost: Free
The format of this app is a little different to the previous two apps I reviewed. The game uses the “swipe left or right” format popularised by another type of app. Simply, a calculation appears on the screen and you swipe left if it is incorrect and right if it is correct.
When you swipe correctly, the card is removed from the deck. The goal is to remove all the cards from the deck as quickly as possible. If you swipe incorrectly, the card does not get removed and you’ll have to solve it again later. You will also lose a life, of which you have four for each game. Most levels on the app have 30 cards per deck.
What I really like about this is the competitive element of it. When you clear the deck, the game records how many seconds it took and you can try to beat it next time.
You are also given a rank, that is determined by how quickly you clear the deck. It gives the player an incentive to improve and a target to aim for. Below you can see the times required to achieve each rank.
You have two choices of game mode when choosing your deck – “Classic” or “MAD”. Classic mode allows you to focus on a specific times table and each deck contains 30 cards.
MAD mode is a mix of all times tables, with the option to attempt larger decks. Even a deck of 100 cards! If you attempt the 100 card level you need to complete it in 100 seconds to achieve Hero rank, but you still only get 4 lives!
When you swipe incorrectly on a times table, the app records your mistake and you can review the times tables you got wrong by navigating to the Incorrect Swipes page. You can see below I am looking at the 12 times tables I have got wrong. I have got 12×11 wrong twice. If I tap on this, it will pop up with 132 so I can do some revision before my next attempt. This is a really good feature.
Another great feature on this app is the ability for multiple players to log on to the app on the same device. You can simply switch between players and make an attempt to beat the other players’ times. You can then see who got the best time. I can see this being a really good way of getting the competitive juices flowing between siblings on a shared family iPad.
Pros and Cons
| Pros | Cons |
| Completely free | A multiple-choice “right or wrong” question type is probably not the best way of improving your times tables |
| App is extremely smooth to use – no bugs | |
| Incorrect Swipes page tells you which times tables you are regularly getting wrong | |
| Comparison between different players on the same device | |
| Targets within the app to strive for |
Conclusion
This is a really good app. The swipe left or right game type is unusual for times tables apps, but it makes the game really easy and fun for the user. The 50/50 nature of the questions is probably not the most useful way of improving times tables recall, but the fun element of the app definitely compensates for this. I’d highly recommend using this app for your kids, especially if they have a sibling they can compete with!
Usability rating = 10/10 (how easy is the app to use and are there regular bugs?)
Enjoyability rating = 9/10 (how enjoyable is the app to play?)
Helpfulness rating = 7/10 (how much would using this app help improve a user’s times tables?)
Overall rating = 26/30
I hope you found this review helpful. Stay tuned for more reviews in future blogs.
If you are in Bristol and your child is struggling with times tables and think they would benefit from maths tutoring, book a free taster session.
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