Penguin Interactive Books for the iPad: Concept Demo

[daffy4u]

From Teleread:

Fellow NAPCO blog Appletell links to a story on iPadInsider (which in turn links to a story on Paid Content) which offers a first look at what “e-books” might look like on the iPad, courtesy of Penguin. I quotate “e-books” because I don’t think I would necessarily call what Penguin had to display “e-books” in the traditional sense.

This is very exciting technology and these types of books are worthy of a higher price.

I do have a couple of issues.

- Kids need to color on paper with a crayon or marker.
- As a portable Travel Guide, I think the iPad is too big. A 6 inch screen would be easier to carry around.

[K-Thom]

Kids need to color on paper with a crayon or marker.

Yup, I totally agree. Otherwise kids will learn how to point and click, but not how to hold or use a pen (or anything other which demands a certain dexterity of the fingers).

But in general: nice concept and a good addition to conventional children's books.

[Marcy]

I don't think these are great at all. Our children are already becoming computer and video game junkies, and there are already many great children's websites with point and click educational content that is very similar.

If everything we give our kids blinks, makes noises, responds to point and click, who are we to complain when they think plain old books are boring. My son is only getting conventional children's books. Plus this takes away one of the biggest aspects of reading to a young child -- the togetherness. He sits in my lap and we don't always read the books, but we point to pictures and talk about them and I ask him to point to things. He loves turning the pages and picking where in the book to look. And if he's really in an un-wiggly mood we read them.

Perhaps it's good for travel distractions, but a bit too expensive for me just for that.

-Marcy

[poohbear_nc]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

From Teleread:


This is very exciting technology and these types of books are worthy of a higher price.

I do have a couple of issues.

- Kids need to color on paper with a crayon or marker.
- As a portable Travel Guide, I think the iPad is too big. A 6 inch screen would be easier to carry around.

I agree with this - developing hand-eye skills in 3-D real life is very important for children. Not to mention finding out your kid was using crayons on the iPad screen!