Giving children the skills to thrive
Supporting children and their teachers and parents
OliTool Ltd’s mission is develop ‘smart’ products for mental health and wellbeing.
OliTool®️ for children aims to help primary aged children develop skills necessary to thrive. It draws on academic research, educational practices and protocols from the field of Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) that combine skills-building with a holistic approach.
Social and emotional skills, such as self-awareness, self-regulation and problem solving, are recognised as being critical for mental health and wellbeing and life success. Some children, especially those with special education needs or vulnerable to mental health challenges, struggle to develop these important skills.
OliTool can help! With OliTool, the child learns to understand their feelings and behaviours and to use strategies for self-regulation and problem solving, building self-confidence and independence. Supervising adults gain a deeper understanding of the child, key to tailoring learning interventions for better outcomes. Improved social and emotional skills lead to more harmonious classrooms and family environments.
The OliTool®️ System
The OliTool system includes an app, a web portal and a toy-like handheld ‘smart’ device, Oli. The system may be used with or without Oli, which is in final development.
The app, available to download via the App Store and Google Play, is a fun and visually engaging social and emotional literacy teaching application, with a structured yet flexible learning approach that offers an effective tool for teachers, parents and mental health professionals. The web portal sits alongside the app for administration, information sharing and data review.
OliTool app’s learning modules help the child develop an understanding of self and strategies for self-regulation and problem solving. The app includes activities for vocabulary building, tracking mood and setting goals along with exercises designed to build gratitude, appreciation empathy. Gamification and rewards are embedded in the app to engage and reinforce learning.
Children use sensory rich Oli to communicate their feelings and behaviours in real time and practice self-regulation strategies learned in the app.
Supervising adults use OliTool to identify, assess and address emotional, behavioural and learning challenges.
Quotes from Educators
‘’OliTool works not only for children who need extra behavioural support but also for children who slip beneath the radar, who we might unintentionally not pay as much attention to but we should. So it can work for children at all ends of the spectrum.”
“The act of making OliTool goals led to really good discussions and searching; those children wouldn’t ordinarily have wanted to have those conversations with me.”
“We need better evidence-based data to benchmark SEN pupil progress across the SEN spectrum. I’ve never seen anything like OilTool, it could signpost to adults where and when problems arise.”
About Us
OliTool’s features and skills-building activities are evidence-based, drawing on multidisciplinary research from fields including child development, social and emotional learning, positive psychology, behaviour change and human computer interaction.
OliTool has been developed with extensive input from teachers, senior school leaders and special needs providers, parents and children, as well as education technology experts, educational psychologists and special education and childhood mental health experts.
OliTool’s development was spearheaded by its Co-founders Lisa Erickson and Deborah Werbner, both of whom have degrees in Psychology.
OliTool Ltd.’s innovative approach to improving childhood mental health and wellbeing through the teaching of social and emotional learning skills with OliTool has been recognised by numerous grant funders and EdTech startup accelerators.
“Oli is the physical acknowledgement that the child has been heard. For the child, it embodies the fact that she is being listened to, building a relationship with their teacher, able to start taking some responsibility for herself. OliTool helps build resilience. It is very powerful.’’ — Special Education Needs Coordinator, User Trial School 2020.
Images from OliTool App
Contact
Feel free to contact us with any questions.
Email
info@olitool.com