Teaching martial arts and good habits with MyDojo World
Ron Curran, a long-time karate instructor and owner of Curran’s Karate approached us with the idea of building out an integrated system that help engage not only martial arts students, but also the people that take care of them in a fun and engaging way.
The Art of Discipline
Martial arts is an art of discipline. Students need courage and motivation to attend class each week, and practicing for years to advance through the belts.
A central problem that many martial art schools face is that once students give up and leave, they never come back.
We wanted to change that.
As our team is specialized in building apps that focus on engagement and fun, this app development project was a great fit. Soon enough, Curran’s Karate partnered with us to develop a gamified platform for martial arts schools.
Discipline is a two-way street
From our initial meetings with the client, we quickly found out much of an instructor's time is spent on admin tasks such as taking attendance and signing up students for classes.
In order to tackle this initial pain point, we designed and developed a companion app to allow instructors to focus on teaching instead of filling out paperwork.
The Companion App
The Instructors
We created an all-in-one dojo management system for the instructors.
They can take attendance, track student rank progression, and update parent and student information to help them rank up and receive rewards for their positive actions.
We also explored the needs of the student's parents, who have a great interest in seeing their children progress in the dojo.
The Parents
The parent app is integrated with the instructor app and game. Parents can use the app and view a dashboard of their child’s progress — both in game and school.
They can assign custom challenges, such as helping with household chores or reading a chapter in a book to reward them after.
To fully round out the experience, we set out to build a game for the students that awards them for practicing good habits. This is an app that aims to capture the hearts of a younger audience with its colours, sounds and visuals.
The My Dojo Game
We designed the game using gamification principles - the MyDojo game serves as the touchpoint that students can engage with and earn their way to being mentally stronger and more disciplined.
As students attend class and complete challenges assigned by their parents, they are rewarded with in-game currencies that enable them to upgrade and decorate their own dojo.
From walls, floors and tiling, capturing the cartoon aesthetic was pivotal in building out a game that could easily attract the attention of a younger audience.
On top of that, we made sure to pay special attention to a colour palette that pays homage to the visuals of a modern dojo.
Key features of the game are also highlighted with bright colours to make sure that while students may complete their tasks in real life, they are also rewarded for their actions.
From ideas to execution
To spark life into the initial concept of the MyDojo ecosystem, we first began with creative briefs and workshops to brainstorm the vision - ultimately refining the concept into characters, backgrounds, and gameplay.
As with any project that we do, we always bring the app into the hands of users to get their feedback. Utilizing in-person and remote user test sessions, we were able to make the user experience better - taking the project to further heights.
To further enhance collaboration, we made sure to meet frequently with the client, reviewing and testing designs and prototypes together that ultimately led to the release of the final product on the Apple and Google Play Stores.
Engaged students, parents, and instructors
Looking back, what came out was a beautiful, gamified platform for martial arts schools, catering to everyone from children, parents, and instructors. Looking ahead, our team is excited to see an improvement in student retention along with wonderful habits and behaviours being taught to young minds - creating better leaders of tomorrow.
✅ Apps successfully completed and launched on iOS and Android app stores
📈 Gamified solution boosting student retention by 25%
🥋 Good habits and behaviours taught to young martial arts students
⭐ 5/5 rating from client on scheduling, cost, and quality
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