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Interactive Storybook
An interactive storybook (or CD-ROM storybook) is a children's story packaged with animated graphics, sound or other interactive elements (e.g., word pronunciation). Such stories are usually published as software on CD-ROMs. They have also been referred to as computer books, picture book programs, books-on-disk, talking books,http://pdf.textfiles.com/zines/CGW/1992_07_issue96.pdf or living books. This software is targeted at young readers (usually kindergarten to second grade) for educational purposes. In their seminal work ''To Instruct and Delight: Children's and Young Adults' Literature on CD-ROM'', H. Bennett wrote, "Something magical and non-threatening happens when a children's story weds a computer." Children's Tech Review wrote that when a children's book comes to a touch screen, it can be called many names, including: “ebooks,” “living books,” “digital story books,” or even “app books.” Examples * ''Disney's Animated Storybook'' * ''Europress Bookshelf'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Interactive
Across the many fields concerned with interactivity, including information science, computer science, human-computer interaction, communication, and industrial design, there is little agreement over the meaning of the term "interactivity", but most definitions are related to Human–computer interaction, interaction between users and computers and other machines through a user interface. Interactivity can however also refer to interaction between people. It nevertheless usually refers to interaction between people and computers – and sometimes to interaction between computers – through software, hardware, and networks. Multiple views on interactivity exist. In the "contingency view" of interactivity, there are three levels: #Not interactive, when a message is not related to previous messages. #Reactive, when a message is related only to one immediately previous message. #Interactive, when a message is related to a number of previous messages and to the relationship between th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Software
Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital computers in the mid-20th century. Early programs were written in the machine language specific to the hardware. The introduction of high-level programming languages in 1958 allowed for more human-readable instructions, making software development easier and more portable across different computer architectures. Software in a programming language is run through a compiler or Interpreter (computing), interpreter to execution (computing), execute on the architecture's hardware. Over time, software has become complex, owing to developments in Computer network, networking, operating systems, and databases. Software can generally be categorized into two main types: # operating systems, which manage hardware resources and provide services for applicat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains computer data storage, data computers can read, but not write or erase. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both computer data and audio with the latter capable of being played on a CD player, while data (such as software or digital video) is only usable on a computer (such as ISO 9660 format PC CD-ROMs). During the 1990s and early 2000s, CD-ROMs were popularly used to distribute software and data for computers and fifth generation video game consoles. DVDs as well as downloading started to replace CD-ROMs in these roles starting in the early 2000s, and the use of CD-ROMs for commercial software is now rare. History The earliest theoretical work on optical disc storage was done by independent researchers in the United States including David Paul Gregg (1958) and James Russell (inventor), James Russel (1965–1975). In particular, Gregg's paten ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Disney's Animated Storybook
''Disney's Animated Storybook'' (stylized as ''Disney's Animated StoryBook'', and also known as ''Disney's Story Studio'') is a point-and-click adventure interactive storybook video game series based on Walt Disney feature animations and Pixar films that were released throughout the 1990s. They were published by Disney Interactive for personal computers (Microsoft Windows and Apple Macintosh) for children ages four to eight years old. Starting from 1994, most of the entries in the series were developed by Media Station. They have the same plots as their respective films, though abridged due to the limited medium. Titles Development Background and Walt Disney Computer Software (1988–1994) Video games based on the Walt Disney Company's properties have been released since ''Mickey Mouse'' for Nintendo's Game & Watch in 1981. Disney licensed out its properties and established partnerships with developers and publishers such as Nintendo, Sega, Capcom, Square, and Sierra, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Europress Bookshelf
Europress was a British magazine and software publisher based in Adlington, near Macclesfield, Cheshire. Their magazine publishing business was previously known as Database Publications. The software division was renamed in 1999 to Actualize. History Europress was formed by Derek Meakin in 1965. It began by publishing magazines and newspapers, then during the 1980s as an expansion of its magazine publishing business, it became involved in the rapidly growing software industry. Under the name Database Software, they released software including the Red Arrows game for the ZX Spectrum and the office suite Mini Office II, as well as games and educational software for children. During the late 1980s Europress decided to spin off its software publishing division as a separate company: Europress Software, with Christopher Payne as managing director and Diane O'Brien as Sales Director. Chris Payne came up with the name Mandarin Software as the brand for all the planned games, graphic de ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Living Books
''Living Books'' is a series of interactive storybook, interactive read-along adventures aimed at children aged 3–9. Created by Mark Schlichting, the series was mostly developed by Living Books for CD-ROM and published by Broderbund for Mac OS and Microsoft Windows. Two decades after the original release, the series was re-released by Wanderful Interactive Storybooks for iOS and Android. The series began in 1992 as a Broderbund division that started with an adaptation of Mercer Mayer's ''Just Grandma and Me''. In 1994, the Living Books division was spun-off into its own children's multimedia company, jointly owned by Broderbund and Random House. The company continued to publish titles based on popular franchises such as ''Arthur (book series), Arthur'', ''Dr. Seuss'', and ''Berenstain Bears''. In 1997 Broderbund agreed to purchase Random House's 50% stake in Living Books and proceeded to dissolve the company. Broderbund was acquired by SoftKey, The Learning Company, Mattel Int ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Wanderful Interactive Storybooks
Wanderful Interactive Storybooks is a developer of interactive storybook apps based on the titles originally published as Living Books by Broderbund Software. The company was founded in 2010 by Mickey W. Mantle, who oversaw the original Living Books technology development as Vice President of Engineering and Chief Technical Officer at Broderbund. Mantle, CEO of Wanderful, assembled a small team of the original Broderbund programmers to create a new engine that could take the animation, graphics, sound and music from the original Living Books CD-ROMs and play them back at full-screen resolution on the iPad using a touch, rather than a mouse driven interface. Mark Schlichting – creator of the Living Books series – joined the team as Chief Creative Officer and developed touch-driven updates to the original mouse-driven interface. Through a number of corporate mergers, the publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt had acquired the rights to the Living Books titles and content. Wande ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Magic Tales
''Magic Tales'' is a series of interactive storybooks for children, developed by Animation Magic and produced by Davidson, which were distributed by Capitol Multimedia, Inc. on CD-ROM for Mac OS and Microsoft Windows. The series was introduced at the 1995 MacWorld trade show. The series began with the release of ''The Little Samurai'' (an adaptation of a Japanese folk tale) in 1995. The stories are narrated by the central character Grandpa Mouse, who reads them to his two grandchildren while they are having a boring time. The series was titled "El Abuelo Ratón" in Spanish. Each story has twelve pages. Games in the series Gameplay The games featured three-dimensional art; approximately 30 minutes' worth of animation, over 500 "click-and-explore" options and original music. The stories were influenced by the ethnic backgrounds of their source material, and aimed to teach children moral lessons. The games were targeted at children aged 3 to 9. Reception Critical reception ''Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Playtoons
''Playtoons'' is a series of linked games, released in 1994 by Sierra On-Line, which allow players to make their own animations using a variety of characters, backgrounds, scenery and props from either a single game or a mixture from the full series. The games are focused on teaching children school topics in a digital format meant to be more enthralling for kids. Included with each game is a cartoon introducing the characters and situations. In addition to playing the story straight through, players can jump to any page in the story, with some of the pages leading to unlisted pages. Series storylines Uncle Archibald The narrator introduces his friend, Ben, who lives with his Uncle Archibald, who owns a shop. In Archibald's past, he wrote stories about witches, wizards, and monsters. He kept a description of each monster on his computer, which Ben and the narrator, peep at. One monster particularly catches their eye: Ogre Kringle, who eats kids with chocolate sauce. Later Be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Reader Rabbit's Reading Development Library
''Reader Rabbit's Reading Development Library'' is a series of four edutainment games from The Learning Company as part of the ''Reader Rabbit'' franchise. The first two games were developed in October 1995 and the last two were developed in 1996. The products make use of interactive storybooks based on fairy tales to help early readers broaden their reading, vocabulary, writing and word recognition skills. Each number in the title corresponds to the reading level of the reader they are aimed at. Gameplay In each game, the player has two storybooks to choose from. There are three versions of each story, the first told by Sam the narrator called the "Classic" version and the latter two as different perspectives of characters from the story. The story can be read entirely by the narrator or it can be read by the user with guidelines. The games also include three activities to further enhance learning to read. With both the manual and automatic modes, users can read the stories at t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Children's Literature
Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. In addition to conventional literary genres, modern children's literature is classified by the intended age of the reader, ranging from picture books for the very young to young adult fiction for those nearing maturity. Children's literature can be traced to traditional stories like fairy tales, which have only been identified as children's literature since the eighteenth century, and songs, part of a wider oral tradition, which adults shared with children before publishing existed. The development of early children's literature, before printing was invented, is difficult to trace. Even after printing became widespread, many classic "children's" tales were originally created for adults and later adapted for a younger audience. Since the fifteenth century much literature has been aimed specifically at children, often with a moral or religious message. Childr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
