The Future of EdTech: A Conversation Elizabeth Adams

Grace Andino: Hello. My name is Grace Andino. Today, we will be exploring the impacts of media and technology on children's literacy skills. Today, we will be joined by child psychologist Elizabeth Adams, who is the co-founder and chief experience officer behind Ello, an award-winning AI app that is revolutionizing the way children are learning how to read. Elizabeth received her bachelor's of the arts in psychology and studies in women and gender from the University of Virginia.

She then earned her master's and PhD in clinical psychology at Gallaudet University. Not limiting the many psychology-based positions Elizabeth has taken on, she has served as founder member at Parent Head Ventures, owner of Personalized Parenting, and APAGS liaison to the Board of Educational Affairs for the American Psychological Association. Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today. 

Elizabeth Adams: Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me.

GA: So I first want to start off by giving a premise to what our topic is, which is just the importance of highlighting literacy in youth and using technology as a way to advance children's responsiveness to literacy. As a clinical psychologist and child psychologist, what made you wanna focus on literacy and technology, specifically? 

EA: Yeah. My journey into tech and being an entrepreneur was a little bit unusual, and, I think that path follows, sometimes quite a different path than than traditional psychology. And so, initially, I was working with my co-founders in a different area.

We were actually working on scaling, parent coaching and parent support, more broadly was the initial idea when the three of us started working together. And, that really came from my clinical work with children and families. And when I had my own kids, so many of my friends would call me and say, “Hey. Elizabeth, can you give me some pointers about, picky eating or bedtime or tantrums? There's so much on Instagram, but I'm not really sure.And I wanna talk to a professional, but this doesn't really feel like it rises to the level of needing to see a clinical psychologist and a therapist, but I feel like I trust you because of those credentials.” So, initially, we were working on a project that was giving parents access to professionals that had degrees in child development around these sorts of everyday parenting problems. And my co-founders and I went through an incubator in San Francisco, called Y Combinator, which supports startups in the tech space. And it's sort of like a crash course in in in becoming a founder in tech. And so we went through that at a very unusual time.

I started that program in January of 2020, and our experience came abruptly to an end in March of 2020, which is a three month program, but it was very obviously, the world changed because that's when COVID really hit. And we had some families that were using our parent support platform at the time. And all of a sudden, all those parents we were talking to were like, “Stop the presses. Schools are shut down. I am now in charge of my child's education. I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm really overwhelmed”, and, you know, that became a focal point for a lot of parents. I have two  kids myself. I have a 4 year old son who was born in June of 20, so I was pregnant when we started this. But, my daughter, who's now 10, was in kindergarten and 5 at the time.

And she was, you know, because schools were closed, she was sitting behind me at a table here, learning how to read, and, the schools were doing the best they could over Zoom, and she was getting all the EdTech thrown at her. And I've spent a fair bit of my career in schools and working with children with language, and learning differences. And, you know, I've spent a lot of time thinking about how kids learn to read and what they need. And as I was looking at the EdTech products that my daughter was using, they kind of fell in two buckets. They were either extremely strong on the pedagogy side, but she did not wanna use them, because they tended to be very dry, very boring, not engaging or motivating, or they were highly engaging, highly motivating.

Lots of gamification principles are used in these apps, but I was like, wow, that is definitely not gonna teach her how to read because that is so far removed from pedagogy. And so we became interested in this space. My cofounder and our chief technology officer, Cali Voss, who's an incredible engineer, who graduated from Stanford, was very interested in child speech recognition. And so he kinda put the pieces together and really literacy you know, we knew that COVID was going to make things a more difficult issue in our country. You know, the literacy rates in the US are not where they should be.

And there's a whole lot I can say about why I think that is, but the most recent findings from standardized testing across the US are showing that, you know, in general, we're talking about nearly 70% of kids who are reading behind grade level. Literacy is such a critical foundation for the rest of education where, you know, kids can make this shift from learning to read when they're very, very young to right here around 3rd grade. They're reading to learn. Like, then they're using that skill to acquire the rest of the knowledge that they need. And if you have a shaky foundation in that first part, it makes the rest of your educational journey really challenging.

And so, you know, it's sort of astounding that we're talking about such high numbers of children that are struggling to learn to read. And the truth of the matter is that 1 on 1 instruction is the most effective thing for kids, but it is wildly expensive. You know, tutors can run anywhere from $40 to $150 plus dollars an hour, for children, particularly if they're evidence based interventionists, and that's not accessible. And so you're talking about swaths of children that are already behind that can't access appropriate intervention. And so, our hope is that technology can play a role in democratizing access to high quality literacy instruction and changing the course for a lot of kids.

GA: I really love that. So I love what you said about, like, the state of the US right now. We're seeing so many things that are kind of dimming a light on literacy. So, where do you think technology comes into play when trying to rebuild children's learning skills since COVID?

EA: Absolutely. I think, you know, kids across the board have taken a hit. But as I mentioned before, I think that the problems with literacy acquisition predate COVID. Like, the scores already work where they were supposed to be. And I think there's a couple reasons that that's happening, but I think, you know, one of them, there's, there's an incredible podcast that went viral last year called Sold A Story.

And if anybody really wants to do a deep dive into literacy instruction in the US, it's fascinating. But it talks a lot about, you know, how pedagogy and approaches to education are influenced by all sorts of things. They're influenced by politics. They're influenced by companies that are selling curriculum to schools. They're influenced by research, and and, you know, for and, you know, for years, psychologists have been when we identify a child, and certainly in my practice when I was doing, neuropsych evaluation, psychoeducational evaluations, when I would identify a child that had dyslexia, we would say the evidence based intervention, needs to happen, and it is direct and explicit instruction with phonics.

And you would recommend, you know, a particular approach based on the child's profile. But at the end of the day, it was direct instruction. Well, we now know and and the leading approach to teaching children how to read, was something that was called, whole language, and it tended to deemphasize phonics as an approach to it in a general education environment. And the idea was if we give kids this love of reading and we just expose them to reading, it'll sort of happen naturally. And then there were some specific practices that were used.

One of the ones that's been discussed very deeply was something called 3 queuing where you would, you would teach a child to read, and you would say, if you don't know this word, you should look at the picture for context to try to figure it out, or just look at the first letter, or does it make sense in the in the context of the rest of the sentence. And so it emphasized that approach rather than teaching the child sort of the code, of how to break down a word and decode a word, where interventionists for children with dyslexia have been doing something very different with literacy instruction for years. They have been teaching kids how to decode language, how to decode words. They're teaching them these two sounds, you know, this is a digraph, and these two sounds make this you know, these two letters make this sound together and really teaching kids how to sort of crack the code rather than guessing a word. And, it was actually, you know, a lot of people in the education field, but people in psychology too kind of raised their hands and said, wait a second.

Like, why aren't we teaching? I think we've gone too far away from a phonics based approach, and I think we need to look at the science, which is relatively clear on what the most successful approach to teaching kids to read is, and it is a more phonics based approach rather than, you know, teaching kids how to guess. And there's all, as you can imagine, there's all sorts of things that are falling underneath that curriculum, are still up for debate, are imperfect in science, but there are some things we know. And, so I think a lot of kids, unfortunately, weren't receiving across the country, weren't receiving the type of instruction that they needed. The reason why I share all that as the answer to how technology can help is because now you're talking about, you know and states have started passing laws across the country now that say you cannot teach a whole language curriculum in a school.

You must teach a science based reading approach. You must use the following curriculums, you know, to approach literacy instruction for kids. Well, the truth is that being able to retrain an entire nation of teachers is going to take a long time. Being able to give kids access to the types of instructional materials that they're going to need is going to take a long time, and technology can allow that to happen more quickly. If you think about it, like, our our, you know, Ello is in that turquoise elephant here that, you know, will sort of sit next to a child while they're reading, and Ello is ever patient.

Ello has the knowledge of a literacy specialist. Ello knows exactly how to teach these skills, and so it allows for consistency and delivery. And we're not trying to, you know, retrain thousands and thousands of teachers. Ello is not to replace teachers. It can't.

This has to happen in partnership with schools. I don't think technology will ever replace teachers or parents. But what it does do is allow for access. And, you know, we know this one of the things Ello did, there's a type of book that's used in early literacy instruction called a decodable book. And a decodable book is basically a very special book that focuses on a specific phonics skill.

So rather than using what they call predictable text books, decodable books, like, if a child is working on CVC words, consonant vowel consonants, cat, bat, rat. You read these early readers that are, like, the cat on the mat, the cat and the bat, and they're very focused on a specific phonics scale. These books are only published by a very small number of boutique publishers. They are often incredibly expensive for institutions to buy, and there's not that many of them out there. And, we wanted to make sure we had this as part of our curriculum, Ello, for kids.

And, you know, I had a heck of a time getting them on our hands, so we decided to create our own. And we brought teachers in. We hired masters level literacy specialists and teachers, and we were able to make 700 books, illustrated books, in 6 months because we leveraged generative AI. The largest children's publisher in the US doesn't publish that many books in a year, and we're a small start up. So that just shows you.

And then what it did was it reduced the cost of production so much that that entire collection of books that we made is free. We put that on the web and made it available to everybody. If there's any parents reading reading or anything publication, allo.com/books. But we're able to leverage technology to make accessibility more feasible for kids that might not otherwise have access. Love that.

GA: So when you're talking about, like, targeting illiteracy, was that always a main focus that you knew that you wanted to, like, go into when you first started your career? And was there anything like that whether it was, like, a real world experience or how you said, like, with your daughter during COVID? So what really made you wanna target literacy head on? 

EA: Yeah. And what you know, I always knew, well, it was during graduate school that I figured out that I wanted to work with children, so I knew that then. And, I knew that I wanted to work with children, and really think deeply about kids who had different developmental paths. So I, obviously, had a huge interest in, and became part of, the deaf and hard of hearing community and spent a lot of time working with kids, many of whom use sign language, many of whom use cochlear implants or hearing aids, and thinking about their development. And through that, I kind of became a very niche specialist, that was focused on kids with language and learning differences, that were often secondary to, medical conditions or brain injuries or developmental differences that were present at birth. And so I spent a lot of time doing that. For kids that have language disorders, there's often cascading complications.

Right? And so I often and when I was working with this population, I would see they would kind of show up in 2 different ways, you know, needing support. One of them is through behavior when they were very, very young, because oftentimes children, there's a correlation between language differences and behavior. Because, oftentimes, if kids have receptive language differences, they are struggling to follow directions, and it can be very frustrating to the adults in their lives. But that's not really a behavior.

It's secondary to the language issue, or they are externalizing and expressing their behavior, because they don't yet have the vocabulary and the language skills to be able to do that in the same way. So I spent a lot of time with little ones working on behavior regulation, but often kids with language differences struggle with literacy. There's a very strong connection there. And so as I was supporting these kids in their educational environments, we often talked about their language and literacy growth, but, I've had the great privilege of working in many different settings. I've worked in hospitals.

I've worked in school settings, inclusion schools for years, before I started on this journey. So I wouldn't say I knew specifically that I wanted to tackle literacy, but I think, as the opportunity was presented of how we can leverage technology to really make an impact in the world, we wanted to make sure that we were doing that in a space that would have a huge impact. And, literacy globally is a huge issue. I mean, it's considered, you know, a world health organization. Like, one of the great things that we should probably try to solve as, you know, in humanity because it can change the course of people's lives, by giving them access to so many things.

And so, I thought, you know, after doing more traditional clinical work for the last 20 years of my career, I thought, well, wouldn't it be cool to work on something that is really this meaningful and could have as much of an impact? But it was connected so closely, to work that I had done and seen in my kind of work in schools and and, when I was doing neuropsych testing and psycho ed testing. And so there was a really tight connection to my experiences that I think kind of led me there through twists and turns. Love that. So I wanna shift towards traditional literacy.

So when people think of, like, paperback books and they think of technology, some may view it from, like, a bird's eye view, like 2 separate ends of the spectrum. So where do you think technology advancement comes into play with traditional books? And do you see it, like, not, like, being replaced in the next couple years, or where do you see the focus being shifted to? Yeah. Well, you know, I still think we have a lot to learn.

I mean, the world is shifting underneath us. Right? And I think technology always presents opportunities, and at the same time, we have to be very careful in considering, okay, as we're introducing this new medium, you know, what are the potential challenges? What are the things we have to be careful about? And what are the opportunities?

Ello does work with some physical books that are an option for families, because I do think it's important that kids have physical books in their lives, that they're holding books in their hands, and they're turning the pages. And, you know, the research supports that, a child's experience reading from a screen versus a child's experience reading from a book could be different. There's questions around whether or not their comprehension can be impacted if they're reading from a screen or whether or not they're distracted by other things that could be happening on this screen. And so you can think of that as an example of, sure. Like, there's a time and a place where kids should be, reading from physical books.

And when you're designing programs where kids are reading from screens, how are we protecting against some of these? So the most established literature shows that kids often skim. They're more likely to skim when they're reading. But not even just kids, people are more likely to skim when they're reading from a screen. And one of the things that we wanted to do with Ello for a number of reasons, we use speech recognition technology.

So a child will read out loud, and Ello listens to the child's reading. And if the child makes an error when they're reading, Ello will correct them with phonics based coaching. If the child gets stuck, Ella is there to support them just like a teacher or a reading specialist would. But the other thing that that does is it prevents skipping because you're forcing the child to read each word out loud. And so it's active engagement versus passive engagement with the screen.

We also know, there's no pop up ads. There's, you know, the screen when the child is reading becomes very focused on the text. And I think that those are opportunities, you know, we know that for some children, with reading disorders, that tracking by words or font color, or other things about the medium can help a child immensely. And what so that's where, you know, that's an example of something that a paperback book might not be able to support a child. So I think there's room for both, but I think we have to be really thoughtful when we're implementing technology, how we're doing that.

One of the things I'm really excited about is, you know, children's literature, existing literature is not without its problems. Like representation, for example, is a huge issue in child's literature. So many kids don't see themselves in books. They don't see children that have their name, that look like them, that have their family structure. That's often not reflected in children's literature.

And we launched a feature recently called story time where kids can choose the character, the setting, and we use generative AI with very tight safety parameters around it to generate stories for kids. Well, we know that letting kids choose what they're reading, is a huge motivator to get kids to read in the first place. Well, think about what technology could do. You could have you basically, if a child wants to read a book about them and LeBron James playing basketball with a dinosaur on the moon, and the child in the book looks like them and is from their neighborhood and their family structure is the same. That's a powerful experience for a child.

I think there are all these opportunities, but, of course, you have to make sure that, one, it is not exclusive and doesn't mean that there's no space for what has always been. There is. And, two, that you're doing it in a way that is safe and appropriate for kids and that we're cautious as this technology comes to be, especially especially with kids that we are seizing it for the opportunities, but making sure that the guardrails are right. Yeah. So I love how Ella was being more installed.

GA: As you said, it's not gonna be replacing teachers, but more of assisting teachers in what their roles are in advancing child literacy. So what are some ways that you've tailored, Ello, to become more focused on literacy eradication and specifically, like, tech advancements and things like that? 

EA: We are a product that is mostly utilized by parents in the home. And so and and we'll have teachers recommend it, and say, you know, we know that teachers are saying I think there was a study, gosh, that just came out this past week showing that the percentage of kids who are reading for pleasure is plummeting. And it's just not something that kids are doing, but at the same time, we also know that time and text or how much time kids are spending reading outside of school is predictive of outcomes. And so teachers, I think, often feel like their hands are tied.

Like, they have influence within the four walls of their classroom and within the school. But when kids go home, you know, they might they might they can't you know, there's nothing the teacher can do. And, you know, talking to parents, particularly in that journey of literacy acquisition, so many parents are saying, well, you know, I read to my child, which is hugely important. But they're like, I'm not a I'm not a teacher. Like, I sit down with my child, and particularly if you have a child who struggles with raping, that experience in the home in the home becomes a fight.

You know? They're arguing with their parents. The parents are like, all I know how to say is sound it out. Like, I'm pretty sure the teacher must be doing more than that. Like, I don't know how to help them.

I don't know how to choose books that are supporting, you know, their literacy journey. And often the right answer for a lot of kids is just saying to the parents, just help them love reading. Just read with them at home. Put on an audiobook. But I think there are many parents, particularly since COVID, when they really saw their child's education in a different way, and they're looking at these test scores where their children are behind.

And they're saying, “I wanna help, but I don't know how. And I can't afford a tutor at home. And I can't afford you know, I don't have access to these materials, and I wouldn't even know where to begin.” That's where Ello can be helpful. And so, you know, we've heard from so many parents, and we have there's 3rd party reviews, you know, on the Internet.

There's a company called reviews. Ello, and I think there's 900 reviews of LO. And, like, if I'm ever having a bad day, it's my favorite place to go, because there's so many stories from families who are saying, like, my child refused to read before this product. It was a fight with me all the time. I wasn't sure how to help them.

Many parents will sit with their kids while they do hello, and they'll kind of, you know, be coached through it. And then the parents will say, oh, I'm actually, like, watching hello and learning. That I'm supposed to use growth mindset encouragement. That I'm supposed to give labeled praises when my kids do well. Here are some, you know, strategies I can use if they get stuck besides just saying sound it out.

And, you know, that on our part, it's basically giving families access to high quality materials and instruction outside of school to help support their literacy journey, particularly for those kids behind, but also for those kids who are ahead, and want to be challenged more. We also wanna make sure we're reaching the right kids. So we have a program called ElloAccess, which if a family gets government assistance, they can get Ello for $3, so that they can have access to that program. And like I said, we made all of our decodable books. We have the world's largest collection of decodable books, and it is free, on any web browser.

And so, you know, those are ways that we are making sure that kids have access, and can and can reach. And we know eventually, we have to partner with schools. We already have teachers asking. We're gonna make a classroom version because we know that, you know, not all kids have connectivity in their home. Not all kids have access to an iPad or a device that could run Ello on it. We'll need to partner with schools to make sure we reach all kids eventually. 

GA: So in closing, I wanna know your experience and also your perspective on where you see the integration of technology and literacy being developed in, maybe, the next four years. Like, where do you think Ello is gonna take literacy rates? 

EA: I mean, I think I think the most exciting thing about the moment that we're in is the opportunity again to give kids this incredibly personalized learning experience. And I think that's gonna happen through technology because it's going to allow kids to be very direct and follow their interests. Right? If you wanna read about, you know, whatever whatever kids wanna learn about, it's gonna be available, and it's going to allow for pacing that is truly personalized to the child, and allow for this high quality instruction to happen. And so I actually think the impact's gonna go much broader than literacy.

I think the impact can also be seen in other educational verticals and teaching kids other content, and I think you can deliver the same high quality instruction around math, around, coding, around sciences, like, anything. You know? And I think eventually, the world is going to shift. I truly believe in the next five years, we are going to see high quality, very safe AI tutors, essentially, that that can support. 

And I think, you know, kids in college, in high school are already doing this a bit with chat GPT. Right? They're going in. They're typing in. They're getting. And you can use it as a tool.Like, how can you explain to me? Not just to get an answer. Can you explain to me? Right? I think that interface for a child requires something very, very different.

And so that's gonna be a little bit slower to come into actualization. And, of course, we wanna make sure that this is safe, that the information is accurate. All of the problems that we're seeing technology grapple with now, but I think I really believe those problems will be solved in the next 5 years and that kids are gonna have access to to high quality support, 1 on 1 through an AI tutor outside of school that can really either catch them up or help further develop their interests. Perfect.

GA: \ Thank you so much for speaking with me today, Elizabeth, and imparting a lot of your wisdom. Thank you so much, Grace, for having me. 

EA: Of course. Have a great day.