In case parents are interested in what the toy and digital industries are thinking about and designing for kids... Digital play that's both mobile and tactile was the centerpiece of what all the adults were talking about at the Digital Kids conference in New York last week, but their insights were like "frozen concentrate" compared to those from a panel of kids aged 8-13. Moderated by … [Read more...] about Notes from a ‘Digital Kids’ conference
tablets
Holiday help: Parental control tools for tablets
With tablets showing up on more and more kids' holiday wish lists (littler and littler kids!), parents will appreciate any help they can get with keep tablet use safe as well as fun. And there's help over at TechHive, which reports that Amazon Kindle Fire HD, Barnes & Noble Nook HD, and Apple’s iPad, all have some built-in parental controls (e.g., FreeTime on the Kindle Fire and Restrictions … [Read more...] about Holiday help: Parental control tools for tablets
6-year-old self-taught pre-readers & tablet users in Ethiopia
Earlier this year, some 40 digital tablets (the Motorola version of iPads) were packaged into two taped-up boxes with no instructions and dropped into two Ethiopian villages, each about 50 miles from Addis Ababa and each with about 20 "1st-grade-aged" children, MIT Technology Review reported. The goal in this experiment, which OLPC chair Nicholas Negroponte says has another 18-24 months to go, is … [Read more...] about 6-year-old self-taught pre-readers & tablet users in Ethiopia
Mobile learning gathering momentum
"Please turn on your cell phone – or your iPad or whatever wireless device you brought from home. Class is about to begin." More and more students may be hearing that instruction at the start of class. It's the introduction to the third and final piece of the Consortium for School Networking's report on mobile phones in as education technology: "Small Size, Big Potential: Mobile Learning Devices … [Read more...] about Mobile learning gathering momentum
Hey, companies, tablets are family devices too!
Someone should find out how many parents there are at Apple, Amazon, and other tablet makers. But maybe it doesn't matter – no matter how many there are, they're just not thinking like parents in designing and marketing iPads, Kindles, and other tablet devices. They need to stop compartmentalizing their lives so much and put on their parent hats at work! Because tablets are every bit as much … [Read more...] about Hey, companies, tablets are family devices too!