spawn for parents and teachers

a game studio, with claude as player two

Your student makes the game. Claude helps. Your student decides.

spawn is the game studio BusinessTech Academy students use in class and at home. They design a game, build it and share it with a link. Claude, an AI made by Anthropic, works beside them as player two: it suggests changes, and the student decides which ones stay.

See what students made How it keeps them safe
your studentmake the coins spin when I grab them
player two · claude Now a coin spins when you touch it, then disappears.
In draw(): coins spin when touchedkeep
+ if (player.isTouching(coin)) {+   coin.rotationSpeed = 20;+ }

To check it: grab a coin. It should spin before it vanishes.

Add changes
checked before it was shownan example, not a student's game

01what they do

They make a real game, start to finish

  1. pick

    Start from a starter game, or keep working on one of their own.

  2. design

    Write, in their own words, what the game is, how you win and how you lose.

  3. make

    Draw the art, build the map, make the sounds and change the code, by hand or with player two.

  4. ship

    Play it through, then share it on Spawn Point, where anyone with the link can play it.

Their teacher built spawn at the school, and the students shaped it. In its first weeks, about two in five new features started as a student's idea or problem report.

02why claude

Practice using AI well, on something they care about

Your student will work with AI for the rest of their life. spawn is a place to practise doing it well, where the result is a game they want to get right:

Where it stands. To see whether this is working, we count how the whole class works with player two. So far, students are good at handing work to it. Checking and questioning what it gives back is still rare, and that is what we are working on.

To find what helps, a new way for player two to explain things may be tried with half the students first, chosen at random. It stays only if it helps, and it is dropped if it puts students off. No student's name or words are ever published.

03safety

Every answer is checked before your student sees it

A second, separate check reads each of player two's answers for anything not right for a high school student. If it finds a problem, or it can't run, the answer is not shown.

Player two is a coding partner, not a companion. It helps with the student's game and declines anything else.

If a student writes that they might hurt themselves, or that someone is hurting them, spawn answers right away, without the AI:

  • Call or text 988, the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
  • Text HOME to 741741, the Crisis Text Line.
  • Tell a school counselor or another adult they trust, today.
  • Call 911 if they are in danger right now.

That message is never sent to the AI. It is filed to their teacher so a person follows up.

Each student has an hourly limit on player two, their teacher can switch player two off for a class period, and a sign-in ends after 30 minutes with nobody using it.

04what's kept

What is kept, and who sees it

Games, drawings and sounds
Saved to the student's account on spawn's server, so they can start at school and keep going at home. The student and their teacher can see them.
What they ask player two

Kept with their account, with player two's answers. Their teacher can read them, to help. Classmates can't.

To answer, player two is sent the question, the game's code and design, and any picture the student adds. These go to the company that runs Claude for spawn, which runs Claude, only to answer. spawn does not add the student's name or student ID, and it trains no AI on student work.

Shared games
Anyone with the link can play a shared game. It shows the game's title and the student's first name, never a last name. A recording of the student's own voice stays silent on the link unless their teacher features the game. A game that isn't featured is deleted 180 days after it was last shared, and the student or teacher can take it down at any time, which deletes it.
Signing in
The student's school ID and PIN, the same ones they use for the academy's other tools. spawn keeps no last name.
Deleting

An account nobody uses for 180 days is deleted with everything in it. When a student leaves the school's roster, their account is deleted a week later.

Ask their teacher and the account is deleted at once: games, what they asked player two, and their shared games. Nightly backups keep a copy for up to 30 days, and a deleted account can't be brought back from them.

spawn has no ads.

05questions

Questions families ask

Does it cost anything?
No.
Can my student use it at home?
Yes. They sign in with their student ID and PIN, and the same limits and checks apply.
Is my student talking to a person?
No. Player two is Claude, an AI, and the studio labels it "player two · claude" wherever it appears.
Can I see what my student made, or what they asked?
Ask them for the link to a game they shared. For what they asked player two, ask their teacher.
How do I ask for my student's data to be deleted?
Ask their teacher. Deleting the account removes their games, what they asked player two, and their shared games.

For teachers

spawn runs in classes at BusinessTech Academy, and it isn't open to other schools yet. If you teach and would like to try it with your students, get in touch through BusinessTech Academy.