Physics teacher and creator Rob Cowen speaks exclusively about New AI-powered study app, Brain Glue

10 Jan

Rob Cowen, a physics teacher with over 14 years of experience in the UK and USA, has launched Brain Glue, an AI-powered app designed to enhance revision for GCSE and A Level students.

Speaking exclusively with ETIH about the launch, Cowen detailed how the app incorporates neuroscience techniques such as spaced repetition and interleaved retrieval practice to improve knowledge retention and student outcomes.

Brain Glue features and functionality

Brain Glue offers more than 33,000 questions across various subjects, each aligned with specific exam specifications. Students can create personalized quizzes tailored to their strengths and weaknesses and receive instant written feedback to guide their learning. Available on iOS and Android, the app allows students to revise anywhere, whether at home, on the bus, or during school breaks.

Cowen explained to ETIH, “Spacing and interleaving is relatively easy to implement. What is more complex, but just as important, is that Brain Glue learns students’ strengths and weaknesses, then recommends quizzes based on what they need to practice most.”

The journey to creating Brain Glue

Cowen’s teaching experience was a driving force behind the development of Brain Glue. Reflecting on his early years as a teacher, he noted a lack of focus on memory retention in teacher training. “When I first trained to be a teacher in 2011, we were taught very little about the importance of memory and how to best embed knowledge into students’ brains, which is pretty crazy really given that’s what so much of the job is,” he shared with us.

The book Make it Stick: The Science of Successful Learning inspired Cowen to integrate retrieval practices into his teaching. However, creating high-quality quiz materials remained a challenge. “I struggled to form this into a habit, generally because it required too much up-front effort for me to write good quality quiz questions,” he explained.

The advent of AI tools such as ChatGPT provided a solution. Initially, Cowen integrated AI-generated quizzes into his existing tool, Mega Seating Plan. He soon realized the potential for a dedicated student app.

“The eureka moment came this time last year, when I realized that the best use of these questions would be within a student app, so that they can revise on the bus, at break times, on the toilet, etc. ‘Duolingo for everything else’ was the idea,” Cowen told ETIH.

“I also realized that for the app to be really useful, the quality of the answers would need to be even higher, and it should give feedback to students after each answer. It turned out that the solution to both of these problems was the same algorithm.”

Rapid development and early success

Within 30 days, Cowen developed the prototype for Brain Glue and launched it in app stores. By spring 2024, students across the UK were using the app to prepare for their exams. Reflecting on his experience with previous projects like Mega Seating Plan, Cowen said, “The most important lesson I have learned from ten years of running Mega Seating Plan is: ‘just build it.’”

Despite his experience, Brain Glue’s development presented new challenges. “Despite my decade of running Mega Seating Plan, I had never built a native iOS/Android app before, so I had a whole new learning curve to climb. A month later, it was in the app stores and – most importantly – being used by my own students to help them prepare for their A Levels,” he explained.

Leveraging experience and overcoming challenges

Cowen shared that Brain Glue’s development was informed by lessons learned from his earlier ventures. “I think of Brain Glue as the app that I always wanted to build,” he said. “I’ve had good success with Mega Seating Plan, helping hundreds of thousands of teachers across the world with their classroom management, but Brain Glue has the potential to directly help students learn. As a teacher, that’s the dream.”

While Mega Seating Plan gained traction through word-of-mouth, Brain Glue requires a different approach to reach its target audience. Cowen plans to use his educational YouTube channel, Cowen Physics, which has over 3 million views, to promote the app.

The next step for Cowen is ensuring Brain Glue reaches the right audience. He noted, “Getting Brain Glue into more students’ hands has been more of a challenge than I’d anticipated. I’m fortunate that my educational YouTube channel, Cowen Physics, can reach thousands of students, so I hope to leverage that to spread the word.”

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