– introduction
The magic formula that reconciles students and math 🦄✨
Making math accessible, structured and a little more fun: that's the ambition of Lykorn, a Swiss mobile application designed for 9th and 10th grade students. Led by Sébastien Déboeuf, a qualified teacher, and Gaël Rebetez, Deputy Rector of the Gymnasium of Bienne and the Bernese Jura, the project combines pedagogical expertise and technology to support daily revision.
Lykorn is based on the Plan d'Étude Romand (PER) and offers a complete environment for students, but also real support for parents and teachers.
The context
During secondary school, many students struggle to keep up with math, lack independence, and don't know where to begin their revision. Even motivated parents don't always have the time or expertise to provide effective support, especially given that the curriculum has evolved since their own schooling.
From the teachers' perspective, classes are often very heterogeneous: some students need to review the basics, while others want to go further, which makes differentiation complex to manage without multiplying the resources.
Lykorn fits into this landscape with a clear promise: to offer a fun tool aligned with the PER, capable of structuring revisions, restoring students' confidence and lightening the load for the adults who support them.
— Project objectives
The technical and educational aspects behind the scenes at Lykorn
To make Lykorn a truly useful tool for students, parents, and teachers, it was first necessary to thoroughly understand their needs, constraints, and expectations. The challenges outlined below guided our UX and technical choices throughout the project.
1. A personalized learning path, within the reality of the classroom
The content had to remain strictly compliant with the PER (Plan d'études romand) and teachers' expectations. Therefore, it was necessary to design a learning path generation engine capable of adapting to each student's learning objectives, all within a user-friendly interface.
2. Motivate over the long term
For teenagers already saturated with screens, Lykorn had to be engaging enough not to end up forgotten in an app folder. Finding the right balance between gamification (Lycoins, mental math mini-games, progression) and academic rigor was crucial.
3. Design an app for three audiences
The experience needed to be clear for students, reassuring for parents, and useful for teachers. Designing a learning path that met these three profiles, while maintaining a single product base, was a major UX and architectural challenge.
In developing Lykorn, the branding and UI were designed to capture the attention of a young audience with a modern, dynamic, and intuitive design. The clean and colorful interface, in dark mode, offers a smooth and enjoyable experience, while remaining true to the app's educational focus. The goal was to create a motivating and welcoming atmosphere, so that students feel comfortable and engaged from the very first use.
The solution of backtik
We supported Lykorn from product design to the complete technical development of the mobile application. With the founders and teachers in the field, we first mapped the real needs: revision situations at home, preparation for assessments, support for struggling students, possible uses in the classroom.
On the technical side, we designed:
- an architecture capable of covering more than 120 objectives of 9H HarmoS and eventually integrating levels 7H to 11H,
- a tool for generating personalized learning paths based on objective sheets or customized questions,
- a content management system allowing the teaching team to easily add new chapters, videos and quizzes,
- a mini mental arithmetic game and a reward and progression system (gamification) that values each small step taken by the student
- a solid foundation to extend the app to other branches (French, German, etc.).
— Project objectives
PER-aligned routes, automatically generated
Students take photos of their learning objectives sheets; Lykorn creates a personalized revision path based on the Romand Study Plan. Each objective becomes a concrete step, with tailored content.
Over 100 educational videos
Short videos, recorded by a math teacher, explain concepts with a realistic tone and examples. They allow students to calmly review anything they didn't understand in class.
Over 2,000 interactive questions
Each learning path is punctuated with quizzes that validate acquired knowledge, identify areas for improvement, and provide immediate feedback to the student.
Customized final tests
At the end of each course, Lykorn generates a customized assessment, allowing the student to test themselves under conditions close to a real test.
Mental math mini-game & Lycoins
An exclusive mental math game helps develop everyday numerical reflexes. With each goal achieved, the student earns Lycoins, boosting motivation and making progress visible.
A tool for parents and teachers
Parents benefit from a reassuring and structured revision framework, while teachers can guide students towards targeted pathways, or use the app to support students who are progressing at different paces.
Driven by this vision, the Lykorn project has already proven successful beyond the classroom: the application has received development aid from the Canton of Jura, has been supported by the Creapole incubator, and benefits from significant media visibility, notably through dedicated articles in the Quotidien Jurassien and on RFJ.
