Fostering children's acceptance of educational apps: The importance of designing enjoyable learning activities

Educational applications (apps) offer opportunities for designing learning activities children enjoy and benefit from. We redesigned a typical mobile learning activity to make it more enjoyable and useful for children. Relying on the technology acceptance model, we investigated whether and how implementing this activity in an app can increase children's intention to use. During the 27-day study, children (N = 103, 9-14 years) used the app to memorize one-sentence learning plans each day. Children used three different app-based learning activities throughout the study. In two standard activities, children reread or reassembled the words of the plan. In the redesigned activity, children represented the meaning of the plan with emojis. Children repeatedly reported on their attitude towards each activity. Subsequently, children reported perceived enjoyment and intention to use the app. Results showed children found the emoji activity most enjoyable, and enjoyment of the emoji activity contributed uniquely towards intention to use. Additionally, children's enjoyment of the app mediated their intention to use the app in the future. Overall, the study suggests that children's enjoyment of an app is crucial in predicting their subsequent intention to use, and it provides a concrete example of how emojis can be used to boost enjoyment. Practitioner notesWhat is already known about this topicEducational applications provide children with unrestricted access to mobile learning resources.Positive attitudes towards educational applications predict behavioural intention to use these applications, at least in young adults.There is a need for more research examining the relevance of enjoyable learning activities in fostering children's sustained usage of an educational application. What this paper addsPositive attitude towards the use of emojis during learning activities uniquely contributed to children's behavioural intention to use the application.Perceived enjoyment predicted behavioural intention to use the application.Perceived enjoyment mediated the effect of attitude towards using learning activities on the behavioural intention to use the mobile educational application. Implications for practice and/or policyThese findings highlight the importance of enjoyment for children's' acceptance of educational applications.Enjoyable learning activities are necessary to ensure sustained usage of educational applications.The paper provides a concrete example of how emojis can be used to boost enjoyment of a typical mobile learning activity.