About this App:
PicPocket Books brings quality children’s picture book literature to digital media. Now, children can enjoy their favorites stories on-the-go, even when they do not have a physical book to read.

This interactive CHILDREN’S STORYBOOK app promotes EARLY LEARNING and helps your children develop READING skills by connecting the audio words and sounds with the written word on the page.

PicPocket Books offer a unique and new experience, combining the beauty of quality picture books with audio recordings and interactive visual text. This combination enables independent enjoyment for children regardless of reading level, subtle support for early readers, and nostalgic fun for adults.

Whether standing in a grocery line, taking a car trip, or waiting in a doctor’s office, PicPocket Books provide personal, interactive story experiences. The books can be downloaded with one click or tap, and provide educational and entertainment value to children and adults alike.

Your PicPocket Book is a perfect complement to regular story time with parents or grandparents, and a gentle alternative to flashy, fast-paced digital media time.

Benefits:

• high fidelity, full-color illustrations that stay true to the original print book
• high quality audio recording
• Learn-to-read highlighting feature
• Animated details emphasize the storyline
• iPad version includes discussion questions for kids, parents, and teachers
• turn pages with an easy swipe

Language: English

PicPocket Books is a member of Moms with Apps, a collaborative group of family-friendly developers seeking to promote quality apps for kids and families.
Recommended Ages:  3-6, 6-10
Subject: BOOK, READING

The MomsWithApps group (and co-founders Lorraine, Jill and Alesha) has been a tremendous support and a source of inspiration. Lorraine’s initiative and spirit of collaboration that sets the tone for MWA has been a guiding light and a model for many of us.

MomsWithApps has also been a fantastic source of information, resources and contacts. I deeply appreciate the conversations and communication – taking place through many different channels – with Ian, Pierre, Jill, Jitka, Lynn, and many others. Again, a very special thanks to Lorraine for the heads up about the MomInspired grant submission opportunity this summer. Also a huge thank you to Krishna of NSCPartners for his extremely generous collaboration and help with development questions.

A really big thanks goes out to Kimberly Clark, especially Steve Paljieg and to Maria Bailey from BSM for the Huggies® MomInspired award and their amazing continued support with strategy, networking and marketing.

I am also grateful to the wonderful publishers, authors, graphic designers, voice talent, reviewers, and testers we work with. Looking back, it is fantastic to see how large that circle has grown, and all the talent that comes together to create PicPocket Books.

Last, and certainly not least, I want to recognize all kids, big and little, who love stories and who want to read anywhere, anytime. I wish you all a plentiful season of thanks and hope that you find yourselves surrounded with books!

A “bookapp” is a term that we have coined within the MomsWithApps group to describe a book that is downloaded as an app (from iTunes) and displayed to be read on the iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad. Some bookapps have animations and other interactive features. Most have audio recordings.  Over at MomsWithApps we have used the term “bookapp” to distinguish apps that are books (storybooks, picture books) from apps that are games on the iPhone. We have been spreading the use of the term within the group and beyond the group through Twitter and conversations with the Media.

photo by Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post

With the growing popularity of iPhones, the iPod touch and the now extremely popular iPad, publishers and app developers are recognizing the advantages of publishing books on the iPhone platform. These bookapps can take a variety of different forms and sport different features. They may be previously published books (that is, you can also buy them in print versions), or the books may be specifically made for the iPhone. The large majority of PicPocket Books’ titles are previously published books: they are also available in traditional print form. Most of our bookapps have audio recordings, animations, interactive features and personal settings. Bookapps are available in digital form through the iTunes App Store from PicPocket Books and also other bookapp publishers like Lyn and Line LLC, Touchoo, Winged Chariot, Watsomaflip, Out To Play, and others. With the digital platform, publishers are able to take advantage of a number of additional dimensions that are just not possible in a print book. Because the digital interactivity is new and different it does draw some criticism and skepticism from some traditional publishers and educators, but others are definitely embracing the new possibilities.

We’re entering into a new interactive art form,” says Rick Richter, formerly the president of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing and now a digital media consultant. Freed from rules about page count and paper weight, digital creators enjoy great flexibility. In the process, they can appeal to nonbookworms, such as computer and game geeks. “If anything, it will lead a lot of kids to books,” says Richter.

"I Can Do It Too!" originally published by Chonicle Books. Bookapp published by PicPocket Books.

I predict that the future will bring a much greater acceptance and familiarity of bookapps. After all, reading is so much fun, and if having  bookapps available on your iPhone means more exposure to stories and enthusiasm for reading, especially for kids, then we consider that a success!

The new Huggybird app from Viva la Media via PicPocket Books will be available in English, Dutch and Spanish.

Where The Mountain Meets the Moon

Grace Lin (photo by Alexandre Ferron)

We’re thrilled that Grace Lin, the illustrator of PicPocket Books’ most recent release, “Round Is A Mooncake,” just won the 2010 Newbery Honor Award last week for her Young Adult novel “Where the Mountain Meets the Moon.

Check out her beautiful work on her website.

Watch as author Grace Lin discusses her award winning book with a group of young readers in this video from The Today Show: Grace Lin on the Today Show

PicPocket Books always uses kids as testers for our new applications, and it is wonderful and amazing to see how intuitive the iPhone controls are even for children as young as 2 and 3 years old. Young kids are naturally curious and they don’t have the initial fear or hesitation towards a new technology device that some adults display.

The iTunes store offers a number of free apps, and free programs are available for PCs. Paid iPhone apps usually top out at $5, whereas you can easily pay close to $100 for an educational program for your PC (think Disney’s new digital library for $79, foreign language tutorials, etc.)

A strong appeal of the iPhone is that it is mobile, and perfect for entertaining kids when you are away from home and caught in an unexpected wait.

So yes, I think kids can use mobile devices like the iPhone for effective learning, and many of the available quality apps are perfect for taking advantage of times when you are caught in a wait. So pull out the iPhone to practice some math facts, foreign language vocabulary, or just to read a good picture book.