I have come a long way in my thoughts towards app usage for our children. They are growing up in an age where digital devices and learning is the norm. These things are not going away, so let’s be sure to seek out the good in all that is available. It was love at first sight for our youngest son when this story Bible arrived from Planet 316 and WorthyKids/Ideals. And then I showed him the augmented reality app. Oh wow!
The combination of the physical Planet 316 Story Bible and the companion Planet 316 Story Bible App really brings the Bible to life. Through the free app, the full-color pages come to life and add to the story on the paper pages. The app is augmented reality. That means it uses the real page and adds (augments) to it. It is usually that a character or animal becomes animated. The picture on the page gains depth – a 3D quality. In the images below, the iPad screen may look like there are 2 Adams when talking to the elephants. That is just how the camera captured it. The characters move, the whole scene is alive. I’ve missed 3D books. I don’t know about your children, but my children have been too rough to keep physical 3D books intact for long.
The book, the Planet 316 Story Bible, is a hard-cover book of a smaller size. This makes it great for smaller hands. It is bound with a standard binding, though a flexi-binding would be better. Not something like a spiral, but a binding that allows it lay flat on its own. I have a few cookbooks bound this way are that awesome. In our house, the children seldom do anything alone. With two or more siblings sitting together, there was one to hold the book open (and turn the pages when needed) and the other could hold the device with the app.
We used my Ipad (Mini 2) for the app. It is also available for Android devices. Our children have their own Kindles – a Kindle version of the app would be awesome. Our only complaint is that in using the iPad/app and the book requires too many hands for one child alone. We did not have a smaller device – smartphone, to test this on, but I think that would be much more doable for a solo child. The other thing we did not test that I wanted to do was using this on the road. We only used wifi at home. The app pulls up and begins the process of reading the page – except we left the Story Bible at home. Every.time.
The real test of things we receive for review is if we continue to utilize them after the review is written. I wrote this after we had been using this for a few weeks. Weeks later as I am publishing this post, my children still are using the app and story Bible. They have “read” the stories – many numerous times. All of their favorites are in here.
Be sure to read more of my Crew mates reviews. Simply click the image below to check them out.
