The purpose of this study was to examine character racial, ethnic, and gender representation of main and secondary of apps designed for preschoolers using a quantitative content analysis. Because of the design of characters for apps differs from other forms of media, this study examined traits associated with racial, ethnic, and gender groups…

The early childhood education (ECE) sector has been subjected to increased governance, which has manifested in an increased focus on monitoring and steering the daily life of preschools. It is well documented that instruments of governance change teachers' priorities and practices. Changes are not always in line with the aims of the governing…

The usage of high-quality learning applications (apps) at home may increase children's mathematical and literacy competencies. This approach was tested in a family intervention study. Intervention families (n = 302) in two German cohorts (N = 500; M (SD)[subscript age] = 61.0 (4.6) months; n[female gender symbol] = 302) received tablets with newly…

Introduction: The main objective of this study was to validate six educational applications developed to train the cognitive precursors associated with mathematics learning in early childhood education students. Method: The mathematical performance of 193 preschool students aged 57 to 79 months (M=63.3, SD=3.7) from various schools was assessed…

Context: In the children's education process, not only children but parents, educators, and teachers are using touchscreen technology-enabled contrivances for better quality of life. Every stakeholder has their perspective on the usage of touchscreen contrivances. A lot of moderators and critical factors affect this perception. Objective: To…

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) has received widespread attention worldwide and technology companies designed educational applications (apps) focusing on STEM. Young children have access to tablets and smartphones and they engage with a variety of apps every day. Prior research showed that young children learn from…

Many technological interventions have leveraged physical activity (PA, i.e., activities that involve whole-body movements) to provide young people with active and productive learning experiences. However, there is a lack of systematic understanding of how PA can serve as a learning medium--for example, how PA can support learning and how to design…

Educational applications (apps) are ubiquitous within children's learning environments and emerging evidence has demonstrated their efficacy. However, it remains unclear what the active ingredients (ie, mechanisms), or combination of ingredients, of successful maths apps are. The current study developed a new, open-access, three-step framework for…

Digital devices such as iPads are prevalent in children's play from an early age. How this shapes young children's play is an area of considerable debate without any clear consensus on how different forms of play are brought into the iPad interaction. In this study, we examined 98 play activities of children in two preschool settings, featuring 2…

This research aimed to examine the effect of the "Matific" platform on preschool students' academic performance in Mathematics in Al Dhafra Region, United Arab Emirates. It also examined the difference between boys' and girls' academic performance after using the "Matific" platform during mathematics learning. An experimental…

Although the acceptance of educational apps and their contributions to learning have been widely researched, none of these studies have examined links between teachers' acceptance of apps and their students' skills. The present study investigated this issue with respect to a new, French-language educational app for helping preschool children…

This study explored certain popular educational apps' vital characteristics and potential profiles (n1 = 50) for kindergarten kids. The profile analysis involved a categorization ascended from an evaluation process conducted by pre-service early childhood teachers' (n2 = 295) at the University of Crete, Greece, using a new instrument, validated in…

Short-video mobile apps are an emergent media form and play a significant role in young children's everyday lives. We explored the parental perspectives of 2-to-6-year-old Chinese children's use of short-video mobile apps. We distributed an online questionnaire that received 266 valid responses from parents and conducted in-depth interviews with…

Digital play is a pedagogical construct used in early childhood to explain young children's engagement with technologies. Digital play draws upon theories of play to explain young children's learning with technologies. This paper proposes the further development of digital play by examining how the digital aspect of digital play may also be…

Today's increasingly rapid technological developments do not only appear in the field of communication but are also needed in education. In the education field, it is expected to instill students with adequate knowledge and critical thinking skills, which are needed for their future. Practicing critical thinking skills can be done with mobile…