Storybook Maker is
basically a desktop publishing app for children (or should I just call it a publishing
app? There is no desktop computer involved—everything is created right on the
iPad… is there a name for this type of program yet?). At any rate, you create
books with as many or as few pages as you like and the result is a multi-media book to read on the iPad or
to save/email/print as a pdf.
Here is a short
demonstration that explains better than I ever could:
Mastering this app
took a little more effort on my behalf. I tried just installing it on our iPad
and waiting to see if my 5-year-old would figure it out for us, but she ignored
it. In the past, Brooklyn and I have had moments of collaborative brilliance
making up bedtime stories together ("Princess Stinkyfeet"), so I had
a vision of us collaborating on a multimedia project in which she dictated
while I typed, she illustrated and I helped arrange, etc. But first I had to
figure out how to use the app. And, in the end, it really was very intuitive,
but there are just so darn many options to wade through first!
When I finally
did sit down with the iPad, it was following a long weekend in NH with the
grandparents. I used the app to create a souvenir photo book in which I
included photos and stories about the places we went and the things we saw. The
app really was ridiculously easy to use, but I didn’t actually use many of the
options available to me: I didn’t change the font size or color, I didn’t use
the stickers or physics objects, and I didn’t draw free hand.
Here is a page
from my initial attempt at using the app:
When I showed
Brooklyn what I had done, she was as excited as I was by the app. One thing
that was interesting though, was that she immediately wanted to do everything I
hadn’t even thought to do the first time around. She took the iPad from me and
made her own book with free-form drawings and stickers that same day. After
that, we explored a bit more together and we were both excited to find the
backgrounds and borders to jazz up our creations. Later, I realized I could
have included even more cool extras in my NH scrapbook, like sound effects,
including the boom of fireworks to go along with my Fourth of July photos.
Here is a page
from one of Brooklyn’s independent creations:
If this sounds
like a lot of work, I suppose it is, but it’s also fun. And it’s certainly a
powerful literacy tool as well. Over the past few days Brooklyn and I have
finally begun to commit our Princess Stinkyfeet ideas to the screen. We’ve been
working slowly, in the quiet moments when her sister is napping. Brooklyn talks,
and I edit as I type. I knew that she was creative, but one unexpected delight
is how much care Brooklyn is also putting into the language. Our basic plot is
that Princess Stinkyfeet has horrifically smelly feet and so she tries many
things to solve the problem, but the smell keeps coming back. Today, after a
page about the princess going on vacation and the townspeople being able to
breathe easier while she was away, Brooklyn instructed me to include the
sentence, “Wherever she goes, the stink goes.” I was impressed with the turn of
phrase, and told her so. That is the type of thoughtful interaction that the
iPad can be a powerful tool in facilitating, if you are willing to put in the
time and energy. Happily, that’s all it takes though—it’s not expensive at
$3.99. And there are no in-app purchases.
This is an app I can enthusiastically recommend to everyone, but I envision it being used most in upper elementary classrooms. So teacher-friends, take note!
