Google, Apple and Microsoft target tech-savvy children with new apps and gadgets

BIG tech firms are catering to little tech users, with a host of new apps and gadgets designed for the youngest audiences.

Tech firms are increasingly catering to young technology users with educational apps. Ellie Newton, 3, Dylan Newton, 6, and Max Wilson, 4, enjoy playing on their Apple iPads and iPhones. Picture: Tara Croser

WITH just weeks to go to the end of school holidays, Google has launched a free movie-making app designed to help children as young as six years old create professional animations.

But the 3D storytelling app described as “digital puppet theatre meets movie studio” is not the only new app targeted at technology’s youngest audience as more top tech firms seek to broaden their reach.

Google’s app, Toontastic 3D, will appear in app stores today, and product manager Andy Russell said it was designed to foster the “next generation of storytellers”.

Google's Toontastic 3D app lets children create, animate, and narrate their own stories.

“It’s a souped-up puppet theatre where kids can move characters around on the screen in a 3D world and all of the animations ... and the stories kids tell gets recorded and turned into a video,” he said. “It feels like playing with Lego or GI Joes or Barbies.”

Inside the app, children can choose to create an animated short or classic story and are prompted with tips on how to structure its narrative, with a conflict, challenge, climax and resolution, for example.

Characters can be chosen or created, and moved around different settings inside the app while the child narrates the story.

Parents are finding their kids more deeply engaged in the new apps than expected. Picture: Dylan Robinson

Mr Russell said apps with tips on how to build tales delivered “dramatically better stories” and kept kids coming back to create more interesting movies.

“We keep hearing from parents as we do our testing that they didn’t try to teach their kids anything but they came back after 20 minutes fully expecting their kids to have moved on but they’re there beaming with these stories they’ve made,” he said.

“Not all screen time is created equal.”

Unlike its predecessor, the Toontastic 3D app can be used on both Apple and Google devices and is available free of charge.

Apple’s Swift Playgrounds app for the iPad teaches children to use code.

But Google is not the only company keen to win over young, tech-savvy audiences.

Toy brand Mattel teamed with Microsoft and Qualcomm to create a smart home solution for children named Aristotle, revealed at the Consumer Electronics Show, that features a smart speaker designed to answer questions, educate children, and reinforce good manners.

Apple also recently launched a coding app for school-aged kids called Swift Playgrounds that feels like a video game but teaches a coding language used to create apps like those from Strava and Disney.