Math for kindergarten to grade 5 · iPhone & iPad

The math is the game.

Mathtale is a small town of math games. Each one puts a real idea in your child's hands, to move, stack, split and try again. There are no coins, no streaks and no cartoon world to get through first.

Tell me when it's out Built for the phone, including a small, older one.

What it is / what it isn't

Mathtale is…	Mathtale isn't…
Hands on the math	Taps on a worksheet
Five minutes, a lot of math	Twenty minutes, a lot of menus
Watching how they solve it	Grading what they wrote
Finding the rule they've outgrown	Marking it wrong and moving on
Coming back to it a few days later	Drilling it once and hoping
Symbols, once they've earned them	Symbols on day one
Missed a week? Pick up where you left off	Missed a week? Lose your streak
Something to talk about at dinner	A score to worry about

The science, out loud

We didn't invent any of this. We just put it all in one place.

Adaptive, and actually adaptive.

Each problem is chosen from what your child has shown they can do, not from their age or a fixed chapter order. A child who's ahead skips ahead, and a child who's stuck gets a different way in.

Wrong answers have reasons.

Researchers have catalogued the predictable rules kids use that almost work, like "always subtract the small digit from the big one." Mathtale knows more than 150 of them. Because it sees how your child works a problem, not just the final answer, it can tell which rule is behind a mistake and show exactly where that rule breaks.

More shows, less waiting.

Short problems, one after another, with no menus or cutscenes between them. Minutes are spent doing math, not waiting for it.

Spaced, not crammed.

We don't count an idea as learned until your child has shown it on two different days. Facts they find hardest come up most often.

Review that doesn't feel like review.

Things your child already knows keep coming back, mixed in with new material. That's how knowing something becomes keeping it.

Pictures first, symbols later.

Children move from objects, to diagrams, to notation. Researchers call this concreteness fading. We call it earning your "×."

For kids

Every animation teaches something.

When a shape folds, you watch it fold along its line of symmetry. When ten ones bundle into a ten, you see them bundle. When pictures dissolve into a number sentence, that's the lesson: the symbols were the pictures all along.

There are no fireworks for showing up and no confetti for a correct tap. Movement is there to catch interest and to show how things work. The good feeling comes from finally getting it.

For parents

A grade is a summary. You need a next step.

"78% in fractions" can't be acted on. Is the problem halving? Equal parts? Something about the number line? You can't tell, and neither can the child.

Mathtale tells you what's going on in plain words:

What they're working on: "Lately: splitting things into equal parts, and why fourths are smaller than thirds."
Something to talk about: a sentence you can use in the car or at dinner, with no worksheet attached.
The real explanation: when your child holds onto a rule that used to work, we tell you which one, why kids reach for it, and what replaces it.
Simple guidance: if school is covering fractions this month, tell the app and it will lean that way. That's the only setting you need.

Everything we tell you is about your child's own understanding, in words you can use.

Why you can trust what we're optimizing for

Built for my own kids first.

I'm a parent, and I built this for my children. Every tile has been played at my kitchen table and argued over by my kids. If it didn't work for them, it didn't ship.

One price, then we're on the same side.

You pay once. After that, we earn nothing more by keeping your child on the screen, and nothing by showing them ads. The only way Mathtale succeeds is if your child gets better at math and you'd recommend it.

When they've learned it, we move on.

We aren't trying to fill a school year or hit a daily-minutes target. Once your child has shown they own an idea, it drops back to an occasional check-in and something new takes its place. Fast learners go fast. That counts as success, not lost engagement.