Academics
CircleQuest
Five readers, one passage, five jobs. Someone names the main event, someone links it to the world, someone asks a question the text can answer, someone pins the hard word, someone pictures the vivid moment. Nobody reads the whole thing alone - the full understanding is what you get when you put the slices together. Spot the claim that overreaches (sounds like a reading but invents a detail), and see why one vivid image, read by itself, can point the wrong way. A tiny, deterministic literature-circle engine, no internet. Ages 9-14.
▶ Play it nowBuilt for sittings of about 20 minutes on the screen. That is our design budget, not a measurement.
Meet your mentor
Every Spark & Anvil app has a friendly mentor character that demonstrates, asks, and patiently scaffolds learning.
Mentored by Circle
#1f8a80 Characters who teach
Meet the cast
CircleQuest's crew ARE the roles of a literature circle - the cast IS the curriculum: each character IS one reader's job, and the whole understanding is the union of their slices, never any one of them alone. Summ the Summarizer names the main event, the one sentence the passage is really about. Linker the Connector links a detail in the text to something true in the world - but only a link the circle can point to. Asker the Questioner asks the questions the text can actually answer, not the ones it can't. Lex the Word-wizard hunts the single hardest word and pins the meaning the sentence demands, not the first guess. Picto the Illustrator sees the most vivid moment - and is the first to remind the circle that the loudest picture, read alone, can point the wrong way. Circle, the mentor, keeps the circle turning: every role gets a turn, and no claim stays unless someone can show it on the page. Nothing leaves the device.
Summ
The Summarizer - keeps one eye on the whole page and names the main event, the single sentence the passage is really about
Linker
The Connector - links a detail in the text to something true in the world, but only a link the circle can point to on the page
Asker
The Questioner - asks the inference questions the text can answer, and knows the difference between a grounded question and a guess
Lex
The Word-wizard - finds the single hardest word and pins the meaning this sentence demands, not the first meaning that comes to mind
Picto
The Illustrator - pictures the most vivid moment, and warns the circle that a loud image, read alone, can mislead about the gist
Circle
The facilitator who keeps every role taking its turn and lets no claim stand unless a reader can show it on the page
What's inside
Learning goal
Five readers, one passage, five jobs. Someone names the main event, someone links it to the world, someone asks a question the text can answer, someone pins the hard word, someone pictures the vivid moment. Nobody reads the whole thing alone - the full understanding is what you get when you put the slices together. Spot the claim that overreaches (sounds like a reading but invents a detail), and see why one vivid image, read by itself, can point the wrong way. A tiny, deterministic literature-circle engine, no internet. Ages 9-14.
Mentored by Circle — no data leaves the device.
How CircleQuest handles your kid's data
- ✅ All progress, settings, and AI-generated content stays on the device
- ✅ No analytics, no tracking, no third-party SDKs
- ✅ Free — no ads, no in-app purchases
- ✅ No personal information collected from children — in line with COPPA (updated by the 2026 FTC amendments)
- ✅ No chat with strangers — play-together rooms use a short code and preset emotes, never typed messages