HOW WE’RE SUPPORTING JOYFUL GROWTH THROUGH PLAY AND LEARNING
We understand play is vital to joyful growth and development – it serves as the lens through which children explore and interact with the world, as well as helping them build relationships and bond with their loved ones.
For over 50 years, Kinder has offered joyful, surprising and playful experiences to children and their families. We are committed to exploring the value of play. How can we help parents build positive play habits which support their children to develop their imagination, foster creativity, form social connections, and learn through digital experiences?
Enter Applaydu. Launched in 2020, it’s a free mobile app which brings Kinder toys to life through augmented reality in a fun world of discovery and imagination.
Developed by Gameloft, an award-winning gaming company with expertise in interactive digital experiences, Applaydu is an ‘edutainment’ app - a space where kids can have fun and learn at the same time. It was designed to encourage different aspects of childhood development and features a mix of varied activities.
Many games within Applaydu have been specifically designed to stimulate imagination and creative thinking. They include: Inkmagination, Stylin’, Tower Blocks, Codeplaydu, Natoons and Story Builder. It also features a word learning game called Word Explorer, which helps children learn the meanings of words and their multiple definitions.
Most recently, we added a new experience to the app called ‘Let’s Story’, an e-book platform which lets imagination run free.
Through an immersive, 360 storytelling experience, parents and kids can craft personalised, age-appropriate stories in 15 different languages. Together, they can select anything from the story’s hero to its setting, to what happens during the story, and even what the reader can learn from it. Interactive prompts help parents guide the narrative along, while highlighted words throughout the story help children build their vocabulary.
For the past six years, Kinder and Gameloft have been working in close partnership with the Department of Education at the University of Oxford, in the UK. With the institution’s vast knowledge of children’s education, our joint aim has been to understand how digital experiences can help support childhood and early years development.
Since the launch of Applaydu, the LiFT (Learning in Families through Technology) research team at the University of Oxford has been using the platform as a research tool. The research focuses on the core areas of vocabulary, creativity and family-child interaction – the three areas identified as important to digital learning and learning in general for young children.
Last year, we held a symposium with the Department of Education at the University of Oxford where we shared the research findings and what they mean for the evolution of Applaydu as we create better learning experiences moving forward. The event saw experts in child development and education, students, the third sector and global organisations including UNESCO, come together to discuss the project.
The research showed digital play can have a positive impact on children’s learning outcomes, and learning can be fun when digital apps are the right blend of engaging and educational.
A direct link was also found between playing Applaydu’s Word Explorer game and enhancing vocabulary. Engagement with the game was especially high; with more than 500,000 children playing the game past level three, and 85,000 playing to level six and beyond. This demonstrated the game’s potential for extended learning.
We’re incredibly proud of everything we’ve achieved with Applaydu to date and are delighted that it has recently been honoured with an array of global industry awards, including awards at The Drum Awards Festival, The Annual Shorty Impact Awards, The Mom’s Choice Awards and The Smarties Global Impact Media Awards.
There’s even more in store for Applaydu over the next year. For instance, we recently launched a brand-new island in Applaydu called the ‘Emotiverse’. The Emotiverse is a new experience that supports children and families in understanding the meaning of human emotions and their importance for human relationships. The content has been developed together with developmental scientists at the Social Foundations Lab within the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Oxford.
Find out more about Applaydu, our ongoing research, and the symposium we held at the University of Oxford in our video:
