Storyplay: Reading with Young Children (and Elmo) Over a Distance

We introduce Storyplay, a system that supports grandparents to read books together with their grandchildren over the Internet. Storyplay is designed to improve communication across generations and over a distance, and to support parents and grandparents in fostering the literacy development of young children. The interface encourages active child participation in the book reading experience by combining a paper book, a sensor-enhanced frame, video conferencing technology, and video content of a Sesame Street Muppet (Elmo). These Storyplay features are intended to improve child engagement in long-distance communication and increase the quality of interaction between young children and distant grandparents. Additionally, Storyplay encourages dialogic reading styles that are linked with literacy development. Results of qualitative formative research with users indicate that Storyplay shows promise in achieving these goals. Author Keywords