Award-winning interactive entertainment producers The Project Factory have partnered with children’s television producers Media Farm to launch an interactive storytelling app for children.
Designed to complement both the kindergarten and primary school curriculum, Junior Storytellers aims to both entertain and improve language skills.
Structured around classic storytelling elements including the ‘hero’, wants, obstacles, secondary characters, travel and conclusions, the app contains different challenges to suit all developmental levels. The app was made with direct input from teachers, parents and education specialists.
“Junior Storytellers brings a child's imagination to life, giving them the tools to create their own stories and share them with their friends and family. Given the ever increasing popularity of iPads in schools and the education process, we feel that an app like Junior Storytellers provides an important part of a child's development and learning experience,” says The Project Factory’s Guy Gadney.
The idea for Junior Storytellers was first conceived 2006 by writer and blogger Maria Tedeschi as a short-form children’s TV series. Media Farm and the Project Factory worked together to re-develop Junior Storytellers into the digital project you see today. Junior Storytellers was funded by Media Farm and The Project Factory in conjunction with the Screen NSW Interactive Media Fund.
"Putting kids in charge and giving them a sense of ownership over the content is a recurrent theme in Media Farm's productions,” says Rami Fischler.
“With Junior Storytellers we've managed to build on that approach, combining a platform that enables kids to create their own stories in a game environment, and a secure social media tool that allows kids to share their stories with other kids worldwide."
FEATURES
– Record animated stories – set up the scene and hit record to animated stories
– Safe online story sharing – parents and educators have complete control over kids sharing online and can help them share the story with family and friends
– Change character emotions – kids can use emotions to make the story richer and help them understand and express their emotions
– Avatar creator – kids can put themselves or other characters they create in their stories!
– Sandbox mode – play around with free-form storytelling!
– Challenge mode – kids are challenged to create a structured story with heroes, wants, obstacles, secondary character and new locations.
– Tutorials for learning – tutorials teach important elements of formal storytelling by example to help kids develop their skills
The free app will be available to download on May 6th from the App StoreSM.