EdTech in the spotlight

Nutriblocks | Founder Claudia Leong | The power of connections and mentors

Established in Dunedin in December 2020, by two academics in the fields of human nutrition and computer science, Nutriblocks develops video games for nutrition education.

‘’Our vision is to help build healthy futures and we do this by sharing nutrition information with children aged 7-11 years in a fun and engaging way,” says Nutriblocks co-founder Claudia Leong.

Thanks to funding from the Centre of Digital Excellence ( CODE ) in 2021 and 2022, Nutriblocks has developed their first nutrition education game “Nutri-Islands” that supports and builds nutrition knowledge and can help prepare learners for future food technology courses. 

Through role-play, learners are also exposed to and encouraged to develop healthy eating habits like drinking water and choosing nutritious foods. “We are embarking on an outreach project to bring Nutri-Islands into schools across New Zealand and plan to explore the Australian market, by attending EduTech Australia in August,” says Claudia. 

As a relatively new start-up, Claudia and her team have been thankful for the connections they have made in the past two years. “Our journey started with funding from CODE who provided mentorship in game design and production. We took part in programmes from Startup Dunedin, SODA, TechWomen, HealthTech, Supernode and AWS EdStart. All have provided valuable business insights, mentorship, and connection with companies in health technology and education technology fields; pointing us in the direction to move forward with valuable advice for the many questions we have had.”

Sport Canterbury also connected Nutriblocks with schools to help with playtesting. Through playtesting and a co-participatory approach to game design, the pilot testing was able to show an increase in participant nutrition knowledge after four weeks of playing the game and using the nutrition resources.

‘’We would love to be connected to schools or organisations who are interested in bringing nutrition education into schools through video games.”  Keen to learn more? Contact Claudia at info@nutriblocks.co.nz

Nice mahi Nurtiblocks! Better food choice inputs will surely fuel our tamariki for better learning success outputs.

Photos: 

  NZPF conference 2022 – Exhibition at the New Zealand Principals Federation Conference 2022   

Nutri-islands – Showcased at Ōtepoti Indies in the Otago Museum in 2022

Playtesting – Playtesting at one of the schools.