How educational are “educational” apps for young children? App store content analysis using the Four Pillars of Learning framework

Experts have expressed concerns about the lack of evidence demonstrating that children’s “educational” applications (apps) have educational value. This study aimed to operationalize Hirsh-Pasek, Zosh, and colleagues' Four Pillars of Learning into a reliable coding scheme (Pillar 1: Active Learning, Pillar 2: Engagement in the Learning Process, Pillar 3: Meaningful Learning, Pillar 4: Social Interaction), describe the educational quality of commercially available apps, and examine differences in educational quality between free and paid apps. We analyzed 100 children’s educational apps with the highest downloads from Google Play and Apple app stores, as well as 24 apps most frequently played by preschool-age children in a longitudinal cohort study. We developed a coding scheme in which each app earned a value of 0–3 for each Pillar, defining lower-quality apps as those scoring ≤4, summed across the Four Pillars. Overall scores were low across all Pillars. Free apps had significantly lower Pillar 2 (Engagement in Learning Process) scores (t-test, p < .0001) and overall scores (t-test, p < .0047) when compared to paid apps, due to the presence of distracting enhancements. These results highlight the need for improved design of educational apps guided by developmental science.

This is an Accepted Manuscript version of the following article, accepted for publication in the Journal of Children and Media: Marisa Meyer, Jennifer M. Zosh, Caroline McLaren, Michael Robb, Harlan McCaffery, Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, Kathy Hirsh-Pasek & Jenny Radesky (2021) How educational are “educational” apps for young children? App store content analysis using the Four Pillars of Learning framework, Journal of Children and Media, DOI: 10.1080/17482798.2021.1882516. It is deposited under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Files

Metadata

Work Title How educational are “educational” apps for young children? App store content analysis using the Four Pillars of Learning framework
Access
Open Access
Creators
  1. Marisa Meyer
  2. Jennifer M. Zosh
  3. Caroline McLaren
  4. Michael Robb
  5. Harlan McCafferty
  6. Roberta Michnick Golinkoff
  7. Kathy Hirsh-Pasek
  8. Jenny Radesky
License CC BY-NC 4.0 (Attribution-NonCommercial)
Work Type Article
Publisher
  1. Journal of Children and Media
Publication Date February 23, 2021
Publisher Identifier (DOI)
  1. https://doi.org/10.1080/17482798.2021.1882516
Deposited November 23, 2021

Versions

Analytics

Collections

This resource is currently not in any collection.

Work History

Version 1
published

  • Created
  • Added Complete_Manuscript-1.docx
  • Added Creator Marisa Meyer
  • Added Creator Jennifer M. Zosh
  • Added Creator Caroline McLaren
  • Added Creator Michael Robb
  • Added Creator Harlan McCafferty
  • Added Creator Roberta Michnick Golinkoff
  • Added Creator Kathy Hirsh-Pasek
  • Added Creator Jenny Radesky
  • Published
  • Updated
  • Updated
  • Updated