Drafted with AI assistance and reviewed, fact-checked and edited by hand before publishing - see our AI transparency page for how we use AI across the app.
We're delighted to introduce Education Beyond as Spelling.Live's Founding Educational Partner - a permanent recognition of the role its founder, Faizel Manjoo, has already played in shaping how the platform teaches children to spell.
Who is Faizel Manjoo?
Faizel is the Founder and Director of Education Beyond, and has worked in education for more than 24 years. His experience spans classroom teaching, school leadership and, since 2018, working directly with private families to support children's academic development and wider educational journey.
He spent nine years at Wetherby School in Notting Hill, teaching across different year groups and preparing children for competitive school entry. He later led Maths at a British international school in Cyprus before becoming Principal of a British international school in Zagreb, where his responsibilities included curriculum development, teaching quality, staff development and academic standards.
Through Education Beyond, Faizel now works with families across the UK and internationally, providing educational assessment, academic development, preparation for competitive 7+, 8+ and 11+ entry, educational coaching, school and transition guidance, and longer-term strategic oversight of a child's education.
Central to his approach is understanding how an individual child learns. Academic results provide part of the picture; how a child thinks, responds to challenge, approaches unfamiliar work and applies what they have learned provides equally valuable information - and that's exactly the kind of thinking we wanted feeding into Spelling.Live.
What "Founding Educational Partner" actually means
Faizel's involvement with Spelling.Live began the way we think it should: by using and testing the platform with the children he works with, and giving us real, practical feedback on how children actually learn to spell - not just how a spelling app is supposed to work in theory. That's since grown into an ongoing role contributing educational thinking around spelling progression, patterns, practice, and how the platform can respond better to individual children's needs.
It's a genuine, ongoing collaboration rather than a one-off endorsement. Faizel's educational thinking feeds into our decisions about where spelling progression goes next, alongside the usage data and feedback we gather from families using Spelling.Live every day.
A video series for parents, coming soon
As part of the partnership, Faizel is developing a series of short educational videos for Spelling.Live, designed to help parents understand how spelling actually develops in children - starting from the very first building blocks (hearing individual sounds, blending simple words) and building steadily from there, a couple of weeks apart, so there's time to put each idea into practice before the next one arrives.
We'll share the first video, and where to find the rest of the series, as soon as it's ready.
Learn more
You can read more about Faizel and Education Beyond on his Spelling.Live partner page, or visit Education Beyond directly if your family would benefit from educational assessment, 7+/8+/11+ preparation, coaching, or wider school guidance.