Apps for Kids: Do they really teach anything?

I've posted a fair amount about how schools can use technology like the iPad to provide services and curriculum support to kids.  Tablet computers will likely replace paper textbooks at some point - and it's really easy to see that coming for graduate schools (maybe even colleges). But, one commentator rightly asked "are these things really suitable for elementary school kids?"  Good question: after all, one of Siobhan's therapists is adamant that we *not* use the iPad as her AAC because of the potential for breakage.

We've seen how young kids - even as young as 3 years old - have an amazingly intuitive ability to use tablet computers to play games and watch videos.  But is there really any learning value?



I'm happy you asked!  I recently found a great resource analyzing the interrelation between media and children's learning:  The Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop.  Briefly, Joan Ganz Cooney was a television producer who conducted a study that would form the basis of Sesame Street.  She believed that media, even TV, could be used to educate children.  The Center conducts research in how digital media technologies can advance kids' learning in core areas like reading, math, science, and engineering.

The report, Learning: Is there an app for that?, details findings from three studies about how young kids use mobile devices and the like (including the iPod touch), whether they learn anything, and how apps could best be designed with kids in mind.  It's a quick read, but here are some of the points I found most interesting:

1. Preschoolers do learn from apps that are tailored to their age group and balanced between entertaining and learning.  Five year olds may exhibit the greatest gains from using the mobile device (as opposed to younger kids).

2. Can mobile devices bridge the technology divide between the haves and the have-nots?  They are relatively low-cost (especially as compared to desktop computers), they are multi-function, and aren't terribly complicated.  Underserved communities, kids, and the elderly may find it easier to enter the digital world through mobile devices.

3. These devices can be personalized and customized to meet an individual's needs, and help them fit in his or her environment.  (I think I'm sounding like a broken record: see my posts on Universal Design and Learning and Cloud Computing and Disabilities Part II.)

Now, given that Sesame Street is itself a technology aimed at kids, you might not be terribly surprised that the report is generally favorable towards including mobile devices in the range of educational tools used by preschoolers.  However, I don't think that discounts the point of the survey. My take on it is this: this is simply the world we live in now.  Our kids are going to be using technology the likes of which we can't imagine.  The technology that we grow up with literally shapes the way our brains function throughout our lives.  So I think exposure to different technologies - whether it's TV, or an app, or a lesson on a blackboard, or a book, or songs on the radio - helps kids learn to access information through a variety of channels.  And the more chances, and channels there are, the more they can learn.

Here are some links to lists of recommended apps for kids:
iPad Apps for the Learning Disabled 
iPodsibilities
And, there's the Special Education section in the App Store itself.