We are a family business, started in 1992 by Bob Hext, who was finding that the games he devised to teach his dyslexic students were more effective than many of the published materials available at the time. Some of the strategies that are now common currency in Educational Games - such as putting letters on dice, and adapting certain classic card games to for spelling and math reinforcement - were originally pioneered by Bob in the early 1990's. The parent Company is based in the UK, where we now employ twelve people.
Since we patented the Eye Level Reading Ruler in 2005 Crossbow has become the UK brand leader for visual stress (Irlen Syndrome) products, with reading rulers and/or overlays in over 60% of the schools and colleges in the country. As well as our own publications we sell a wide selection of resources from other publishers, representing what we feel to be the best multisensory teaching resources suitable for dyslexia teaching support available in the UK.
Our USA branch carries a smaller range, concentrating on Visual Stress (Irlen Syndrome) resources and a selection of Crossbow's own publications, plus the Junior Learning range. Junior Learning are a new company, and it is run by a neuroscientist, so they know what they are doing! We have known the founder for many years, and we think their stuff is great.
We often get asked the question: "Why Crossbow?" Well, we do believe that our stuff hits the target, but more than that, we're Christians. We believe that the symbols of the Cross and the Rainbow stand for the most powerful, life-changing truths on this earth: broadly, "Jesus died in my place, (for my sins)", and "God keeps His promises". We endeavour to maintain a Christian ethos in the way we run our company, and we hope you find this reflected in the quality of our products and the level of our service.