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We're really pleased to have received another award for one of our products, from NAPPA. Thanks NAPPA, Jack and his mother will be very happy, those magic beans were definitely worth it.

"The National Parenting Publication Awards recently named Jack and the Beanstalk by Mindshapes as an Honors winner in the Children's Media/Virtual category."

Casper is everyone's favourite ghost and we've been seriously spooked by the success of our latest app, Casper's Scare School: Costume Closet. To celebrate the launch and to show off all of Casper's fantastic costumes, we ran two Halloween themed costume parties for our customers first in New York and then in London.

In addition to dressing up in ghoulish costumes, in New York we had a craft session where kids could make candy necklaces and in London we found a scary balloon artist who had the children transfixed, and also had a bubble disco that had them jumping up and down in their witches hats and dracula teeth! 

Both events featured face painting which had the kids lining up and then re-emerging with brilliant halloween faces!

To celebrate the launch of 3 new apps this month, we held a fantastic party for some of our customers (and their parents) at London's 'Maggie and Rose' club in Kensington. We hadn't anticipated how much fun it would be. Even though we regularly take our apps home for testing with our own kids, and do regular testing in our affiliates schools, there is nothing like an iPad party to get kids excited. It might also have been the kiddy snacks, balloon animals and brilliant face painting.

Our team had a great time talking to parents too and finding out more about how they discover and use apps for their children. My favourite moment was when we were discussing how children instinctively understand technology, when right on cue one of our little friends came up and started doing their own product demonstration to their mummy!

We had loaded up our iPads with the new releases; Hickory Dickory Dock, Meteor Math and Lingo Zoo, but we also found that some of the younger ones still loved discovering and playing with our Jellytoons, and the ever popular Jack and the Beanstalk by Mindshapes. We put the trailer for Hickory Dickory Dock on the cinema screen and the kids loved watching the mouse bounce around, in fact our friend 'Hick' has become something of a hero! If you haven't seen the trailer you can watch it here.

We made the top 50 list! 

Mindshapes

Location: London
Sector: Mobile education
Website: www.mindshapes.com
Educational app pioneer founded by Playfish’s Shukri Shammas in 2010. Rather than license big-money IP it has put faith in its own creations. It launched two apps so far based on the Jellytoons brand and is planning to release more for iOS by the end of 2011. Its first app was named as the #1 Education App for Kids by parenting website Babble.com.

Mindshapes’ Jack and the Beanstalk app has just been awarded the Children’s Technology Review ‘Editor’s Award’! 

“CTR’s Editor’s Choice Award are given to only the highest quality children’s products in the interactive media category. These are “no fail” products, worthy of their cost, and able to keep children engage for days at a time.” 

Jam-packed with interactive tasks, exciting visuals and fun characters, Jack and the Beanstalk is a new breed of app designed to unleash the educational potential of your iPad, iPhone or iTouch. Rather than offering simple distraction, at Mindshapes we believe learning for kids and fun go hand in hand.

Jack and the Beanstalk features a ton of game like activities created by Mindshapes’ award-winning design and animation team, while the challenges and interactions have been overseen by Mindshapes’ educational consultants to develop a range of skills through play.

We’ve learned that kids send cute text messages (“mom, I need toilet paper”), that Gen Y mommies are handing kids iPads to kids as young as two, and that they’d rather do without tv than the internet. I was shocked to see just how many mommy bloggers (oops, Mom’s who blog!) are interested in corporate sponsorship and PR agency representation, but gratified to see many more who blog for the greater good.  There were great presentations on social media, blogging, and the importance of peer networking.

The highlight of the event, for me anyway, is the incredible response from bloggers, and Huffington Post and Parenting Magazine editors, to Mindshapes’ Jack and the Beanstalk and Jellytoons apps. I’m looking forward to being able to work into my 60 second pitch that Jack and the Beanstalk is now at #30 in the app store and climbing fast!  

As if the excitement of a 24-hour turnaround to get ready for the biggest blogger’s convention in the United States wasn’t enough – we’ve just found out that our latest kid education app Jack and the Beanstalk is now an Apple Featured App - Way to go team Mindshapes!! 

Blogher

It’s been quite an adventure so far.  Mega tube delays and a mad dash through Heathrow kicked off the journey with a nice shot of adrenaline. Then a little time to cool my heels on the eight-hour flight to Chicago – not to mention the three-hour immigration queue with added infant stroller and drug sniffing dog obstacle course. Next it was time for another mad dash through O’Hare.  Security workers were shockingly blasé when my newly acquired Japanese blogger friend and I explained we were going to miss our flights if we stayed in the queue. But the weary, downtrodden travelers were absolutely wonderful – they didn’t bat an eyelid when we decided to bolt for the security cordons, shouting “help please we’re gonna miss our flights!”

I’m still en route as I type this (last leg to San Diego). I’ll be checking in with Sshmooze and the official Blogher app to see if there’s any Blogher peeps hanging out in the hotel before the event’s official morning kick off. We’ll be posting highlights of the conference – including educational industry developments and trends. 

We’re super excited to announce the launch of our latest educational kids’ apps, Jack and the Beanstalk, available now on the app store. 

Why Jack and the Beanstalk?

Jam-packed with interactive tasks, exciting visuals and fun characters, Jack and the Beanstalk is a new breed of app designed to unleash the educational potential of your iPad, iPhone or iTouch. Rather than offering simple distraction, at Mindshapes we believe learning for kids and fun go hand in hand.

Jack and the Beanstalk features a ton of game like activities created by Mindshapes’ award-winning design and animation team, while the challenges and interactions have been overseen by Mindshapes’ educational consultants to develop a range of skills through play.

Physics 101

More like a game for kids, our app helps children develop fine motor skills - kids swipe and tap clouds to make it rain and grow the beanstalk, while kitchen centric tasks like helping to clean up plates, load the dishwasher and create bubbles, might even inspire budding mother’s little helpers. Throw in a little physics – no heavy reading, just play with some magic beans – and you’ve got an education app sure to engage the most discerning toddler or young child.

We’re thrilled that the Babble team have selected our first app, Jellytoons Toddler Skills: Bobo’s Birthday Challenge, as their #1 Education App for Kids! It’s also their #4 App overall. Check out their review here

Check out the trailer for our first interactive book!

Mobile team gathers to check out the first build of our Jellytoons Birthday Countdown interactive book

The wonderful thing about working in a company that resembles a mini-United Nations, is that we often get international treats. We’ve recently been treated to Polish chocolates and Lebanese baklawa as well as more local goodies such as marshmallow cupcakes from London’s Primrose Bakery. Not to be outdone, I brought in some good ol’ American Krispy Kreme donuts fresh from Harrods.

It’s nice to get such positive responses from the app bloggers. Cool Mom Tech wrote “so well designed I think it may become the gold standard for toddler apps to come.” Apps Playground noted, “There are lots of fun play-apps for toddlers on iPhone and iPad, and a lot of educational apps too. Very few manage to nail both: truly entertaining and educational apps, rather than being entirely silly or overly po-faced. Jellytoons Toddler Skills: Bobo’s Birthday Challenge fits the bill, though.” As the great reviews come in, we’re busy working on our next few titles of “gold standard” educational apps for kids.

Hooray! The first app in our Jellytoons series for toddlers is available in the iTunes store. The silly and adorable (if I do say so myself) Jellytoons were created for the youngest of learners, the toddler. Bobo, Max, Pip, Noodles, Inky, Flo and Rex entertain while challenging the toddler with critical thinking and motor skills activities. We’re all celebrating and posting the news to our FB accounts. 

Shukri, Ramez, Alina and I hopped the Big Pond to attend the Engage! Conference that happened to coincide with Toy Fair and Fashion Week in NYC. The two-day conference was packed with informative sessions on app strategy and development, gamification, digital kids and social games. We also navigated the NYC subway system to upper Manhattan on both mornings to meet with the principals at several of NYC’s most highly regarded elementary schools. We learned about how the schools were integrating technology into everyday teaching. I can’t wait to get some of our apps into the students’ hands for testing.