Pick the goal that sounds most like you — each path is one small mission, with exactly where to tap at every step. App links open in a new tab, so this page stays beside it.
Friends, family, partners, groups — one card, one turn each.
Your level, scaffold support, your own answers — about what matters to you.
Your own material — typed, uploaded, or photographed — QR setup, printable cards.
Classrooms, English corners, meetups, teams, camps, community events.
Open hungry.unison.club ↗ in any browser — nothing to install.
Brand-new device? Tap Get started → (the app follows your phone's language) → set the essentials (🏫 Classroom or 🎉 Social · card style · your Level · an optional topic — plus 📎 Upload file / photos and 📷 Take photos once you're signed in) → Start playing →. A line on the table then repeats what you chose — Your cards: Classroom · Scaffold · A1–A2 — with a button straight to Card Settings; it goes by itself after a few seconds. Returning devices land straight on the table — and you can rerun the whole setup anytime at hungry.unison.club/#tour ↗.
Sign in with Google when offered — the setup's topic step offers it right there. It's free: a signed-in account gets 60 cards, then 3 a day, and your progress follows you across devices.
Got a code? Tap ⋯ (top right) → Full Access, type it under “Have a license code?”, tap Unlock. A code switches on everything: your own topics, uploads and photos, event codes and Multiple sessions (a free sign-in's first 60 cards take your own topics, uploads and photos too).
Two piles on the table (Meal = deeper · Snack = lighter) — tap a pile to draw; which two piles you get comes from your Deck. 👥 top left = play together. ⋯ top right = the menu: Card Settings, Deck, printing, sign-in, codes. On a drawn card: SKIP passes it (always okay) · DONE ✓ = you talked about it · reveal/hide shows or hides pronunciation + translation · tap any word for its meaning with 🔊 · 👍/👎 teach it what to ask you.
Don't browse every feature alone. Pick one real situation, use Hungry with another person, and notice whether the card helps more people speak. The features people often miss are in Don't miss.
Path 01 — Conversation
The card asks. Everyone answers. Hungry gives a table a simple structure, so a good conversation doesn't depend on luck — or on whose language is stronger.
Open Hungry ↗ on one phone.
Tap a pile to draw — Meal = deeper questions; Snack = lighter.
Read the question out loud. Answer it yourself first, then hand the phone to the next person.
Anyone can tap SKIP — no reason needed. Tap DONE ✓ after each card you actually talked about.
After five cards: did anyone new speak? One good question beats an hour of small talk.
Tap 👥 (top left) → Start a session → 📱 Show join QR code. The others scan it with their camera — or tap 👥 → Join a session and type the 4-letter code from your screen. Turns rotate by themselves: a yellow frame around the screen means it's your turn to draw. The host's deck and card settings apply to the whole table.
This is the quiet engine of the whole app: it discovers what your table likes to talk about, and deals more of it. Tap 👍 under a card you enjoyed — more like it come. Tap 👎 to flag a problem — wrong or confusing wording, not interesting, inappropriate — and it steers away. Rate honestly for ten cards and the deck starts to feel like it knows the room.
Signed in (within your first 60 cards, or with a code):
⋯ → Card Settings → under Vocab or topics (optional), 🎬 Rehearse a situation.
Pick one of the twelve suggested for you, or tap ＋ Your own and type one you have coming up → Done ✓.
Its steps in the order it happens, up to 16: Snack asks each step the lighter way, Meal the deeper way, and each answer shapes the next card. Adjust the questions first, if you like.
To switch, just tap another: the choices stay open. After the last one, pick Another round (a new version) or Usual cards; at a table, the host picks.
You don't need perfect English to practice with your child. Open Hungry ↗ on the phone you already have.
Want a topic everyone likes — food, school, weekends? Sign in with Google (free; your first 60 cards can take your own topic, and after that a code does), then ⋯ → Card Settings → Vocab or topics (optional). Or just tap a pile: the cards work for any table.
Read the card out loud, answer it yourself first, then pass the phone. Everyone answers every card. In Scaffold style each card comes with example answers to read and hear 🔊, with the Chinese meaning under each one.
If the teacher sent a QR code, sign in with Google (free), then scan it with the phone's camera: the cards come from this week's lesson. Scanned without signing in, it sets only the teacher's level and style. A teacher's event code needs no sign-in.
A trip or a first day coming up? 🎬 Rehearse a situation (how): the youngest draws Snack, the grown-ups Meal, and everyone plays the same situation.
Try this: after dinner, one topic, ten cards. Tell us (jesse@unison.club): who answered, and whether you'd play again tomorrow.
Path 02 — Language learning
Hungry is built to help you use a language with another person — at your real level, on topics you actually care about, with your own words welcome.
⋯ → Card Settings → Level (Pre-A1–C2) — pick one, or two next to each other for a range. It should stretch you, not shut you out — start one lower than you think.
Pick Bilingual at the get-started style step — Social tables start there, Classroom tables start in Scaffold. Both languages side by side, question and answers. When you try Scaffold (below), turn Answer translations On to keep each option's meaning while you still need support.
Tap any word on a card — its meaning appears in your Language 2, with 🔊 to hear it. reveal/hide toggles the help for self-testing.
⋯ → Card Settings → Card style → Scaffold. Set Practice in to the language you're producing. Tap Done ✓.
Draw a card. You get a reply frame + example answers — tap an example to slot it into the frame and say the full sentence.
None of them is what you mean? Tap ＋ my own answer and type the exact thing you want to say — any language, even mixed.
It comes back fitted to the reply frame, at your level, already selected. If what you mean can't fit the frame, the frame itself is revised just enough — the changed words show in red. It's saved — it will be there on this question next time, and it sharpens what the cards ask you about.
Say the full sentence out loud to another person. That's the rep that counts.
Interests: ⋯ → Your Profile → tap interests to add them — cards steer toward what you care about. Precise practice: ⋯ → Card Settings → Vocab or topics (optional) — type a situation (“ordering food politely”) or must-use words (red, cat, blue…), then Done ✓. The next cards build around it — a brief “One moment — fresh cards coming” is normal. A situation in order: 🎬 Rehearse a situation, under the same box — one of twelve, or the one you have coming up (how). Chinese learners: Pronunciation puts zhuyin (bopomofo) or pinyin above every character — the 注音 follows the Taiwan school dictionary. English: IPA or respelling (US/UK) · Japanese: furigana · Korean, Arabic, Hindi, Bengali, Hebrew, Thai, Armenian: romanization — all under Pronunciation.
⋯ → Card Settings: set Practice in to the language you're practicing, and your Level — start one lower than you think.
Practice alone first: draw five cards, read and hear 🔊 the example answers, then say your own — ＋ my own answer fits what you mean into the frame.
At the exchange, one phone per table: read the card, answer, pass it on. When the small talk runs out, the next question is already there.
Turn the help down as you go: Scaffold → Bilingual → Picture.
Something coming up? A job interview, a trip, a first day: type it into 🎬 Rehearse a situation (how) and practice it card by card, alone or at the table.
Tell us (jesse@unison.club): which level felt right, and whether the table kept going.
Path 03 — Teaching
A speaking warm-up becomes parallel conversation: groups talk at once, mixed levels share a table, and the next question is always ready.
⋯ → Card Settings. Type your topic or must-use words in Vocab or topics (optional) — or feed it the real thing under Lesson material (optional):
📎 Upload a worksheet, PDF, Word doc, spreadsheet, or text file — or several photos at once from your library. 📷 Take photos opens the camera inside the app: snap a textbook segment page by page, then tap Use ✓. The cards now come from that material. A choice appears alongside it — Explore around it or Stick to it — test/review: for test prep pick Stick to it and every question stays inside the document. And if you upload the same document again another day, its cards come back instantly.
Set Card style + Level, tap Done ✓, then draw one card yourself to sanity-check it before class — the first draw can take a few seconds while fresh cards build.
Stations / own pace: Card Settings → 📱 Share setup (QR code) — each student scans it on their own device and can then set their own Level. Signed in (free), they get your exact material + settings; signed out, only your level and style. For your material with no sign-in, use an event code. One shared turn-taking table: 👥 → Start a session → 📱 Show join QR code (host's settings apply to all).
A class too big for one table: 👥 → Multiple sessions — open as many parallel tables as you need, each with its own level and topic; every join code shows on one screen (project it) or prints 1–6 per page for the desks. Walk into any table to listen, or take a seat. Opening tables costs nothing — only the cards your code generates count.
Screen-free: Card Settings → 🖨 Print cards… — pick how many, card size (4/8/12 per page), and what to include (pronunciation · translation · scaffold) → print or save as PDF, cut on the dotted lines.
Try this — use Tuesday's material: upload or photograph something you're actually teaching this week. Draw with two different levels set, and check both learners could answer. Then print a few cards or share the setup by QR. And let students 👍 cards they enjoy — the deck learns the class's interests, which pays off on free-conversation days. (Own topics, uploads & photos come with a free sign-in's first 60 cards or any code; event codes and Multiple sessions need a license code — ⋯ → Full Access.)
Rehearse alone first — ten minutes, no children. Open the app with your own page: ⋯ → Card Settings → 📷 Take photos of the unit → Use ✓ → Done ✓, then draw three cards yourself and answer them out loud. The first time in front of the class should be the second time you have done it.
In class — card time, fifteen minutes. Say “card time”, tap 👥 → Start a session → 📱 Show join QR code; one device between two; the tables talk at the same time. Your job is to walk between tables and listen in. Children tap DONE ✓ after each card they talked about.
If something breaks. Wifi gone: the cards already on the devices keep playing, 🔊 works on the device, the printed cards are the backup — see If the wifi drops. A device gone: the session runs without it, and any tablet becomes yours: sign in on it and scan your setup QR (📱 Share setup (QR code)).
Your numbers. With a license code, ⋯ → ✓ My licence & usage stats shows the code's cards this month, and License Usage → shows them day by day for its last 14 days of use. Every card drawn counts — never a child, never a recording. With one code per class, it shows each class.
The lesson survives — by design. The cards a device has already played stay on it and keep playing offline, including your own topic cards; the app itself opens offline once it has opened online before (a brand-new device needs wifi the first time). The 🔊 reader is on the device. The printed deck is the backup that never fails, so print a few cards before a big class. Your whole setup lives in 📱 Share setup (QR code) — sign in on any tablet, scan it, and it becomes your tablet in ten seconds. When the network is back, everything catches up on its own; nothing to reload, nothing to dismiss.
⋯ → Card Settings → 📷 Take photos of this week's page → Use ✓ — or type the topic in Vocab or topics (optional).
Sit in the turn order: 👥 → Start a session, and answer the cards too — or pass one phone across the table.
Test week? Stick to it — test/review keeps every question inside the page.
Homework: Card Settings → 📱 Share setup (QR code) — once your student signs in (free), they play the same page at home; scanned without signing in, it sets only your level and style. Next week it's in 🕘 Earlier settings, on this device.
An interview or a trip coming up? 🎬 Rehearse a situation → ＋ Your own → type it → ✓. Adjust the questions changes any line; written down in order, the answers make a paragraph.
Tell us (jesse@unison.club): whether your student answered every card, and whether they played at home.
Path 04 — Groups & schools
The useful question is not only “does the app work?” It is “where does this make conversation easier for the people we serve?”
Warm-up · curriculum deck from your material · mixed-level groups · take-home QR · printed cards.
NOTICE: WHO SPEAKS?
Snack pile (= lighter), Bilingual style, a work-safe typed topic. One phone — or a QR per table.
NOTICE: WHO JOINS IN?
Five minutes at dinner, a travel scenario, date night, a topic everyone genuinely cares about.
NOTICE: WHAT OPENS UP?
One phone around the table: nothing to set up — tap a pile, answer, pass. SKIP is always allowed; say so out loud when you host.
A table of phones: 👥 → Start a session → 📱 Show join QR code (tap the QR to enlarge) — or read the 4-letter code aloud; joiners tap 👥 → Join a session. Yellow frame = your turn.
Mixed English–Chinese room: ⋯ → Card Settings → Card style → Bilingual — nobody becomes a spectator. Mode: Social for gatherings, Classroom for class.
Fit the room: type the group's topic in Vocab or topics. Next group? ⋯ → Reshuffle Deck starts fresh.
Before the night (event codes need a license code): 👥 → Events → 🎟 Event codes… → ＋ Add event codes: the languages, a start time, how long it lasts and a card limit → Create code.
Test it with a phone that has never used Hungry.
On the night, show the QR on a screen or print one per table. Guests scan it with their camera; there's nothing to sign up for.
A phone each, and tables that pick their own topics? 👥 → Start a session, then tick Players choose topics first on the session's screen: each phone picks up to five topics, and the table plays every topic picked, the most-picked most often. Several tables at once: 👥 → Multiple sessions has the same tick box. Or give the night one situation: set it with 🎬 Rehearse a situation before you start, and leave that box unticked.
At the end, the code's tile shows the cards played and the tables' answer to “Did they like the questions?”
Try this: one table first, twenty minutes. Tell us (jesse@unison.club): how many tables ran, and whether they kept going without you.
① A structured setting: class, workshop, team meeting. ② A voluntary setting: family, friends, free-choice time. ③ A shared topic the group already cares about — typed or photographed. ④ A mixed-level table: does support bring quieter people in? Run five cards in each. Record where setup felt easier, who spoke more, and which settings changed the result.
Why it is built this way
Most speaking apps put one student in front of a screen. Hungry puts two to five students in front of each other, and the screen only holds the help.
This matters for three plain reasons. First, a child says more when a real person is waiting for the answer. Second, when two students work on the same question they can go further than either one alone — one knows the word, the other has the idea. Third, new ideas come out of people talking, not out of one person answering a machine.
The screen gives the question, the frame and the words. The talking belongs to the children.
You do not learn to speak by listening alone. You learn by speaking.
When you say something out loud, your brain must find the words, put them in order, and get them out — now, to a real person who is waiting. Reading and listening never force you to do that. Merrill Swain gave this idea its name in 1985: taking language in is not enough, you have to push it back out.
The second part is what happens when it goes wrong. You say something. Your partner does not understand. They ask again. You try other words. Michael Long argued in 1996 that much learning happens right there, in the repair. Being honest: some studies support this and some do not. It is a real effect, not a sure thing, and only one part of learning a language.
So why a classmate, and not the teacher? Jenefer Philp, Rebecca Adams and Noriko Iwashita (2014) say it plainly: teachers are teachers and peers are peers. They offer different chances. When the teacher asks the class, one child answers and the rest wait. With a classmate, you talk the whole time. And students are more willing to say “I don’t understand” to a classmate than to a teacher. “I don’t understand” is the door. A child who will not say it is a child the lesson passes over.
What Hungry does about it: two to five students sit facing each other, turns are dealt in order so every child speaks, the cards come from the teacher’s own material, and the help sits on the screen where they can hide it when they are ready.
Three plain things happen when a child explains something to another child.
First, they must pull it out of their own head. Henry Roediger and Jeffrey Karpicke showed in 2006 that students made to recall something remembered far more two days and a week later than students who read it again — even though reading again felt easier.
Second, they must say it to someone. Logan Fiorella and Richard Mayer found in 2013 that students who actually explained a lesson still had a clear advantage a week later. Students who only prepared had almost none. Preparing is not the same as speaking.
Third, it comes back. Nicholas Cepeda and colleagues (2006) reviewed hundreds of experiments: practice spread over time beats the same practice crammed together.
Does talking with classmates work? The best answer is a 2020 review by Harriet Tenenbaum and colleagues, pooling 71 studies of children aged 4 to 18. Peer interaction did better than the other ways of learning it was compared with — best when the children had to agree on an answer, not just take turns.
Now the honest part, from the same study: peer interaction was not better than one adult sitting with one child. So this does not replace a good teacher. It is how you give every child time to talk when one teacher cannot sit with each of them.
What Hungry does about it: the card asks a real question the child must answer out of their own head, everyone speaks, the words come back over the following weeks, and it sits on top of the teacher’s lesson — never in place of it.
Kevin Dunbar spent a year inside working science laboratories, watching how discoveries were made. He reported in 1997 that the weekly lab meeting was one of the main places new ideas were born. One person shows a result. Others ask questions the presenter had not thought of. Alone, Dunbar found, people struggle to think of a second explanation for what they see — in a group, somebody else supplies it. And when a result was strange, the group talked about it far more than when it was expected.
Brian Uzzi and colleagues looked at 17.9 million scientific papers in 2013. Papers written by three or more people put an unusual combination of ideas into their work more often than papers by one person.
Here is a picture to explain it: one person with a torch can only look where the torch points. Two people with two torches look in two directions — and each sees what the other’s light landed on. That is what a conversation does with ideas.
Being straight about it: this research is about scientists, not children in an English class. Nobody has shown that talking in pairs turns children into inventors. It does show that the question you did not expect is what moves thinking — and only another person can hand you one.
What Hungry does about it: the cards come from the teacher’s own material, so the unexpected question lands on something the class actually knows — and a real person sits across the table to ask it.
One last thing
Hungry is extra speaking practice on top of your normal lessons. It does not replace them — it gives students far more turns to actually talk.
Every class, all term — and once a week at home. Short and often beats long and rare.
About ten cards in class, five at home. Everyone gets a few turns.
Shoot for a few cards most days. That's where it really moves.
Connect it to what students are learning right now — this week's page, this week's words.
Tap any word you don't know — that's how it sticks. If you're tapping a lot, step the level down a notch.
Keep the level high enough that students meet some language they don't know yet — and low enough that they still understand almost all of the question. Almost never tapping a word? Step up. Tapping several times just to understand the question? Step down. The app also offers a step up or down on its own.
Before you go
Hungry is deliberately flexible. The best first run changes the setup, uses a real topic, and includes another human. Tick them off as you go — this page remembers.
1. Where did Hungry make starting or continuing a conversation easier? 2. Which feature was hard to discover? 3. What would make you use it again next week? Send them to jesse@unison.club — we read everything.