T. Rowe Price Launches Teacher Edition of Its Popular Star Banks Adventure® Game for Kids
New Classroom Mode helps teachers and parents build kids’ financial capabilities by focusing on key learning opportunities and tracking progress
May 17, 2017 /3BL Media/ - T. Rowe Price has launched a Teacher Edition of the Star Banks Adventure game, a free app and online experience designed to teach kids financial concepts while having fun. The game was designed with a tile-matching concept to engage kids quickly and to reinforce the financial concepts embedded within the game.
The new edition of the award-winning* game, which has been downloaded 423,000 times since its launch in 2015, was created to help teachers integrate the game into their lesson plans on financial education. The game was also designed to help both teachers and parents gain insight into what financial concepts their kids understand and which concepts may need more explanation and opportunity to practice.
The Star Banks Adventure game will appear the same to kids, but the new version offers a Teacher Dashboard to assist in administering the game in the classroom. Additionally, the dashboard provides statistics that help teachers compare their classrooms with others and track individual students’ progress.
With educational content created by CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNERTM professionals at T. Rowe Price, the Star Banks Adventure game simplifies basic financial concepts and focuses on:
• Setting a financial goal
• Prioritizing spending
• Rate of return
• Asset allocation
• Inflation and time horizon
• Diversification
Success in the Star Banks Adventure game requires smart financial planning and wise investing. Players partner with Odal, an alien guide, to stop Overlord Zek, an evil mastermind bent on causing financial chaos. Players can use different star banks to save coins and build space devices to travel to the planet Polaria. Kids solve puzzles, answer quiz questions, and use power-ups to triumph in this space adventure game, while interactive game mechanics make keeping track of investments throughout the game both fun and easy.
T. Rowe Price teamed up with Scholastic to help bring Star Banks Adventure into the classroom. During the testing phase, feedback from teachers included:
“These types of apps and the level of teacher supervision to check student progress in real time are beneficial, and I have enjoyed using them before. I think that my middle school students would indeed relate to the visuals of the program. The visuals are very modern and video game friendly, which appeal to middle schoolers. As a mom of a middle school student myself, I would love for my son to have this type of app or program available to him at school.”
- Sharon, IL
“It's a great enrichment resource.”
- Deborah, TX
The Star Banks Adventure game is available for download on iOS and Android ® devices and online at starbanksadventure.com. More information about the game and additional financial education resources can be found on MoneyConfidentKids.com.
* The Star Banks Adventure game won the Excellence in Financial Literacy Education’s (EIFLE) Instructional Game of the Year award in 2017
Quotes
Renee Christoff, head of Corporate Social Responsibility at T. Rowe Price
“We’ve received great feedback about Star Banks Adventure and wanted to strengthen the game’s ability to serve as a classroom tool for teachers. Since the game was developed and launched, we’ve tried to find the right balance of education and fun. With Star Banks Adventure, we wanted to bring financial education to life, both in and outside of the classroom.”
Ann Amstutz Hayes, senior vice president of National Partnerships at Scholastic
“It’s important for young people to learn about the value of money. That is why we are working with T. Rowe Price and teachers nationwide to prepare middle- and high-schoolers for financial success.”
About T. Rowe Price
Founded in 1937, Baltimore-based T. Rowe Price Group, Inc. (NASDAQ-GS: TROW) is a global investment management organization with $861.6 billion in assets under management as of March 31, 2017. The organization provides a broad array of mutual funds, subadvisory services, and separate account management for individual and institutional investors, retirement plans, and financial intermediaries. The company also offers a variety of sophisticated investment planning and guidance tools. T. Rowe Price's disciplined, risk-aware investment approach focuses on diversification, style consistency, and fundamental research. For more information, visit troweprice.com or our Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Facebook sites.
MONEY CONFIDENT KIDS and STAR BANKS ADVENTURE are registered trademarks of T. Rowe Price, Group, Inc.
Contact Us
Heather McDonold
410-345-6617
heather_mcdonold@troweprice.com
Brian Lewbart
410-345-2242
