THESIS-DEFENSE

IOSR Journal of Research & Method in Education (IOSR-JRME), 2021

Technology has impacted each aspect of our lives, including education. Education is no more confined to the classroom; students are now learning in an anytime anywhere framework. The COVID 19 pandemic has furthered this trend.Through this exploratory research, the researchers have surveyed 144 Parents and relatives of children, in the age group two to twelve years, to understand the potential for using an educational application to make learning fun for children. Results indicate that Parents and relatives of young children are inclined towards using educational apps for children and opined that children would be able to learn better by using educational apps. Findings suggest that the educational app should have more of video and games, making the experience engaging with modules having screen time not exceeding 3 hours per day. These findings are of particular use to organizations involved in developing online education learning apps for children.

This report outlines the key findings of a co-produced study, developed in collaboration between academics at the Universities of Sheffield and Edinburgh, the BBC (CBeebies), Monteney Pirmary School and the children’s media companies Dubit and Foundling Bird (Appendix 1 outlines the project team members and Advisory Board members). The project was co-produced in that all project partners contributed to the development of the project aims and objectives and were involved in data collection, analysis and dissemination. The aim of the study was to identify pre-school children’s (aged 0-5) uses of and responses to tablet apps in terms of the impact on their play and creativity. It was felt that the need for the project was significant, given evidence of growing access for young children to tablets that are able to host apps. Ofcom (2014) has reported that 65% of 3-7 year-olds live in a household with a tablet computer (Ofcom, 2015:23). The National Literacy Trust (NLT, 2014) undertook a survey of 1,028 children aged three to five in 2013. They found that 72.9% have access to a touch-screen device in the home, a figure which includes smartphones. Whilst these data are very useful, neither study examined the types of apps that children aged under 5 in the UK use and little is known about how apps are used by pre-school children. This lack of knowledge is of concern, given that this is large, and growing, market. It was reported by Shuler in 2012 that 72% of the top-selling apps in the Education section of Apple’s app store were aimed at the pre-school age group and, therefore, some account should be taken of how apps are chosen and used by families of pre-schoolers. In addition, there have been repeated calls regarding the urgent need for research into the media and technology use of this age group (Buckingham, 2005; Gillen and Cameron, 2010; Holloway, Green and Livingstone, 2013). Whilst there has been a range of studies of pre-schoolers’ use of apps, these have largely focused on storybooks (Kucirkova, 2013; Merchant, 2014) or on educational use in early years settings (Lynch and Redpath, 2012), and not specifically focused on an analysis of play and creativity. Play in the digital world is becoming increasingly complex due to children’s use of technologies and this use creates synergies between online and offline and digital and non-digital play (Burke and Marsh, 2013; Marsh, 2010, 2014; Marsh and Bishop, 2014). There is emergent evidence that use of tablets by the under 5s can promote creativity and play (Verenikina & Kervin, 2011), but further research is required on the types of creativity and play they foster. Theories of play as a complex, multi-faceted phenomenon, which encompasses various rhetorics including play as identity, imagination and power (Sutton Smith, 1997), were employed in the study. Digital technologies have been found to impact on play in a number of ways. Firstly, digital technologies can offer a platform for the use of games embedded in hardware that promote both rule-bound play and free play (Plowman and Stephen, 2005). Secondly, digital technologies can be a stimulus for imaginative play, such as physical play based on characters and narratives encountered in video games or virtual worlds (Marsh, 2014; Marsh and Bishop, 2014). Thirdly, digital technologies can be used in children’s play as objects e.g. children using smartphones to make pretend phone calls (Plowman et al., 2012). The primary focus for this project was the way in which the use of apps promotes play. Hughes’s (2002) taxonomy of play was utilised to identify episodes/ aspects of play. These classifications of play were adapted for a digital environment (see Appendix 2).

2016

This study builds on and contributes to research on digital play with young children. Previous research has examined digital play from different viewpoints, but no studies have specifically addressed young children\u27s perspectives as they interact with applications (apps) that have been designed specifically for their age group. While our review of the literature provides insights from investigations of young children\u27s perspectives, there is limited research on preschoolers\u27 views on the apps designed for them by adults. In this article, we discuss young participants\u27 perspectives on the apps that they engaged with in our research. In particular, we emphasise the importance of various contexts for digital play in relation to meaningful conversations and social interactions. Our findings provide insights about how children choose to engage in digital play and through this, pose implications for the design of apps

British Journal of Educational Technology

British Journal of Educational Technology , 2018

This study is the first to systematically investigate the extent to which apps for children aged 0-5 foster play and creativity. There is growing evidence of children’s use of tablets, but limited knowledge of the use of apps by children of children of this age. This ESRC-funded study undertook research that identified how UK children aged from 0-5 use apps, and how far the use of apps promotes play and creativity, given the importance of these for learning and development. A survey was conducted of 2000 parents of under 5s in the UK, using a random, stratified sample, and ethnographic case studies of children in six families were undertaken. Over 17 hours of video films of children using apps were analysed. Findings indicate that children of this age are using a variety of apps, some of which are not aimed at their age range. The design features of such apps can lead to the support or inhibition of play and creativity. The study makes an original contribution to the field in that it offers an account of how apps contribute to the play and creativity of children aged five and under.

Childhood Education, 2019

Advances in Mobile Learning Educational Research

Applications (apps) available as educational in digital app stores for preschoolers claim that they offer to learn content on a wide range of basic academic skills, including counting, reading, and pattern recognition. This research aimed to investigate the educational quality of a range of educational applications for Android and iOS Operating Systems aimed at preschool-age children, i.e., children from 3 to 5 years old. The evaluation was done using two scientific tools: the rubrics published by Lee & Cherner entitled "A Comprehensive Evaluation Rubric for Assessing Instructional Apps" and by Papadakis, Kalogiannakis & Zaranis entitled "Designing and creating an educational app rubric for preschool teachers". The research results showed that most proclaimed educational applications did not have a real educational value. Research extensions are discussed.

International Journal of Early Years Education, 2017

This 203pp report describes the results of a survey of 2000 parents (47% families including a child aged 0 to 2 and 52% families including a child aged 3 to 5) who had access to a tablet device. The survey was undertaken in early 2015. The report provides detailed information on the background to the study, main findings and appendices with details of the survey questions and analyses of responses. The study is the result of a collaboration between the Universities of Sheffield and Edinburgh, CBeebies, Dubit, the children's television production company Foundling Bird and Monteney Primary School, Sheffield. The project was funded by the ESRC Knowledge Exchange Opportunities programme (ES/M006409/1). More information at www.techandplay.org. Citation for the report: Marsh, J., Plowman, L., Yamada-Rice, D., Bishop, J., Davenport, A., Davis, S., Robinson, P. and Piras, M. (2015) Exploring Play and Creativity in Pre-Schoolers' Use of Apps: Final project report. Sheffield: University of Sheffield.

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