Contributed by Dave Young, Zoodles Director of Product Design

The characters that children love are powerful tools able to incite both positive and negative behavioral patterns in children. It isn’t hard to find examples of how cartoon characters can undermine a parent’s authority in deciding how to raise their children.  However the interests of the businesses that create this content and the families that consume it don’t have to be at odds.

It’s easy to understand the motives of each group at a high level. Content creators want to entertain your children so that they can influence your consumer habits, while Parents want to raise children that are happy, healthy, and smart.

Between these lines there is great opportunity to align the interests of both parties. The company that aligns itself with the interests of parents is the better company.

Raising happy children:

Everyone is thrilled to be working together to help parents raise happy children. If a character makes a child happy, the parent is happy and will buy branded merchandise which makes the company happy. For this reason there’s a ton companies out there competing to entertain your children. We should recognize this as an opportunity for parents to expect more from these brands and be more selective over which characters they allow into their homes.

Raising healthy children:

It’s really hard for busy parents to raise healthy children and frustrating when their efforts are at odds with some of the branded characters their children love.  The content creators, in the effort to get better brand exposure, are inadvertently harming your children by associating their brands with foods that lead to serious health problems such as obesity and diabetes.

This has been popping up a  lot in the news lately:

The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) is threatening to sue McDonald’s if they don’t stop distributing Happy Meal toys within 30 days. CSPI claims the use of Happy Meal toys is illegal and predatory and lures kids into unhealthy eating habits.

“McDonald’s is the stranger in the playground handing out candy to children. McDonald’s use of toys undercuts parental authority and exploits young children’s developmental immaturity — all this to induce children to prefer foods that may harm their health. It’s a creepy and predatory practice that warrants an injunction,” stated CSPI litigation director Stephen Gardner in a letter to McDonald’s CEO.

http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/06/24/should-mcdonalds-ditch-the-happy-meal-toys/#ixzz0rvMxdIlD

The findings, reported online June 21 in Pediatrics, reflect on the food preferences of 4- to 6-year-old boys and girls who found foods tastier when the packaging bore the likenesses of beloved TV and movie characters.

“So the priority should be first to get these characters off of unhealthy foods,” she added. “And then as a goal ultimately to get them actually put on the packaging for healthy foods. But first we have to focus on dealing with the unhealthy options, because I don’t think slapping them on healthy foods while they’re still on unhealthy foods is going to work.”

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/diet-fitness/diet/articles/2010/06/21/cartoon-characters-sell-kids-on-unhealthy-foods.html

Raising smart children:

Unfortunately both parents and teachers face some really tough challenges in these economic times. Budgets are being cut left and right in our schools and at home.

Zoodles is working really hard on a very creative solution that aligns the interests of content creators with those of parents and teachers. Content creators are a bit ahead of the curve trying to market the brands you buy offline by providing free games online (eg. Dora The Explorer Games, Blues Clues Games, Sid the Science Kids Games, Curious George Games, Lego Games etc etc). The internet is a great place for these brands to market themselves because parents and teachers have come to accept that while TV “rots the brain” computers offer new interactive educational opportunities.

However, parents and teachers need a solution that doesn’t require their constant supervision. They’re afraid of their children accidentally deleting files or navigating to content that’s inappropriate or too advanced for them to play independently. They’re afraid of these things because they happen all the time.  Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, and Chrome are all designed for adults and are too complicated for children to use on their own.  Parents can’t Google to find the best games for their children because Google’s search engine doesn’t understand the ways in which their child is currently developing or the implications of their child’s special needs. Google doesn’t know how to rank search results for your child based on the state and national educational standards. Even when parents leave their children alone on reputable childrens sites, their children are exposed to images and video advertisements for Viagra, the Playboy Bunnies, and violent video games that, thanks to these advertisements, are only a click away.

This is the reason why Mark Williamson founded Zoodles, and we have something really great to offer. Our service is designed to be simple and easy to use for both parents and children. All parents have to do is enter in their child’s birthdate and we help you select the best content for their age, making sure that all the games they play are both fun and educational.  As your child gets older, Zoodles adjusts the games we recommend to them to help them develop the skills that they are currently learning. We have an educational team that helps us select the best of Nick Jr Games, PBS Kids Games, Disney Games, and National Geographic Kids Games. We also have games from some sites you probably haven’t thought to visit before, including the best of NASA Kids Games, StarFall Games, American Girl Games, Fact Monster Games, Nobel Prize Educational Kids Games etc etc  (the list goes on and on).

Kids are happy because they are having fun. Parents are happy because their children are learning while playing independently. Content providers have the opportunity to build stronger relationships with young families. Best of all, everything I just mentioned is free!  

Zoodles also offers some great premium features for parents that want to have a more proactive role in their child’s development.  We help parents block ads, set time limits, adjust violence filters, and block the brands they might be getting sick of (eg Barney Games).  Parents can even choose to promote educational subjects to help their child spend more time playing fun math games or fun reading games.

Parents and Teachers are excited that they can now review the educational merits of the games and brands that are available online. Content providers for the first time are able to quickly identify what skill sets their target demographic needs help learning and quickly assess the strengths and weaknesses of their competition in that space.

We think Shrek can do a lot more for your children than sell Happy Meals.

There’s a huge opportunity ahead of us for brands to align with the interests of both parents and teachers. With so many brands to choose from, parents should have more control over which brands they welcome into their home, based on the quality of content coming from these characters.

Well, we’ve been a little bashful about sharing pictures of our new office, but now that we’ve had some time to clean it up and hide the power tools, we’re ready to share!

Let’s start from the very beginning…

Before finding our dream home in Mountain View, we spent a LONG time looking at other places…

… but none of them felt quite right.

Then we met 655 West Evelyn.

When we first walked in, we knew we had a project on our hands…

…but something about it just felt right.  So we talked, and we talked…

…and we decided to move in.

We proceeded to pick out paint colors, measure walls, and strip out wires…

…until the work was done.

And one month later, here we are, in our brand spankin’ presentable new office!

It’s hard to believe that it’s already been a month, but living in Mountain View has been incredible so far. Between the Subway across the street and the two hundred Thai restaurants along Castro, we couldn’t ask for a better place to be!

The location is especially superb because of its ridiculous proximity to Caltrain.  There it is, right outside our window.

Our beverages of choice have remained largely the same…

As have our spirits…

And our sense of humor…

In the end, we’re just glad that the world can finally share in the fruits of our labour.

But please don’t be deceived — moving wasn’t all a breeze.  As most of you know, moving can be a difficult transition for anyone in their lives.

For Zoodles, the move induced a Coke Zero drought that was extremely hard on all of us – Mark in particular.

He can be seen here drinking Diet Coke, a beverage that signifies struggle.

Luckily, we have now equipped ourselves with enough Coke Zero to last us a lifetime.  So the Zoodles team will soldier on, once in Palo Alto and now in Mountain View, working hard for families everywhere — and thanks to Coke Zero — making Zoodles all that it can be.

While Zoodles has been available for about year, today is a bit of a coming out party for us.  We have spent the last year largely “under the radar” working incredibly hard to build a great experience for children and parents.  We’ve been very lucky to have passionate parents who’ve taken the time to not only give us feedback on our product, but even bring their children into our offices and help us better understand how to make Zoodles better for kids!  This feedback has led us to develop many of the unique features we have today, such as:

• Educational controls that allow parents to promote specific subjects (e.g. – Math or Reading) to their child
• A violence filter that allows parents to control the amount of violence they are comfortable exposing their children to online
• Our unique child interface that adapts to a child’s age and cognitive abilities

There are dozens of other changes we’ve made based on user feedback — in fact, in the last year, we’ve updated the service more than 250 times!

All of these iterations have brought us to the point where we are ready to “officially” announce the product and begin marketing Zoodles more broadly.  We are also excited to announce that we have been working with the great folks at Harrison Metal.  Michael & Erik from Harrison Metal have been great partners, and our new financing provides us the opportunity to accelerate user growth and hire more great engineers!

Finally, I want to thank our users for all the feedback that has helped shape our product.  Last year I noted that Zoodles won a prestigious NAPPA Gold Award and today I am excited to share that we have recently won two additional awards:

• Parents Choice Award
• National Parenting Center’s Seal of Approval

We have many exciting updates in the works, but there’s really no reason to wait… go ahead and get all of your relatives 8 years old and younger to try Zoodles.  I am certain they will have a lot of fun, and their parents will love it as well!

Are you a teacher who’s tried to use Zoodles?  Whether your school has SmartBoards and computer labs, or nothing at all, Zoodles is interested in hearing about your experiences using Zoodles in the classroom.

Teachers today have interesting ways of using Zoodles – whether it’s playing games as a class on the Promethean board, or setting up multiple student accounts in the lab – one per grade – we’ve been fascinated by all the ways that teachers have adapted Zoodles to meet their needs.

With that said, we’d really love to make Zoodles something that adapts to you, rather than the other way around.  So if you or anyone you know is a teacher who’s interested in giving Zoodles feedback, send us an email at feedback [AT] zoodles DOT com, and we’ll work with you to set up a 20 – 30 minute call.  In exchange for your time and good will, we’d be happy to give your school a year of Zoodles Premium in return.

Thanks so much, and we hope to be talking with you soon!

Contributed by Debbie H. Zoodles Education Team

In the process of working for Zoodles in the past ten months, I’ve encountered a wide array of different games for children. Every so often, games will pop off the page and become part of your daily conversation. Most recently, I have been really excited and consumed by the American Girls games. They are designed with a function that meets the needs of learners: they teach facts about the United States and world cultures. In addition, the design meets the needs of children in ways that are fun — I find the games engaging at my age, and I have no doubt that I would have also enjoyed them as a child playing on Zoodles.

The foundation of the games are the different American Girls, each of whom hosts games that uniquely suit her personality, background and culture. By creating three-dimensional representations of different types of girls, Zoodles players will be able to identify with the different American Girls characters. American Girls doesn’t reinvent the wheel- they redesign it in a way that is purposeful and unique.

In “Kit’s Railway Adventure,” girls are able to see the United States from the perspective of early settlers. Through a series of visits across the country, Zoodles players are exposed to early colonial history.

In “Samantha’s Scavenger Hunt,” your child learns about United States history and culture by going on a scavenger hunt with Samantha in 1904, New York. Concepts of early times are taught in fun ways- only second to visiting Jamestown and Williamsberg!

It’s also encouraging to see that the American Girls site also acknowledges immigration and girls from all over the world. For example, in “Rebecca’s World Word Search” children play their favorite word search games, but are exposed to new, sophisticated words about Russian culture.

Likewise, in “Rebecca’s Russian Doll Mix-up,” children can play their favorite matching game but learn about a new culture at the same time.

In “Josefina’s Santa Fe Market Adventure,” Zoodles players learn about economics and the roles of buyers and sellers, as well as basic Spanish language vocabulary by going on an adventure looking for goods at the Market.

If your child ends up on the American Girls site, you will be in good hands. We look forward to hearing what your child thinks of the new games on Zoodles!

We’ve been proud of features in the past, but the latest feature we’re here to announce truly breaks new ground:  Zoodles violence filtering.

Here’s how it works:

1)  You read how we rate the games.

2)  You choose what rating level is right for your child.

3) We take care of the rest.

Zoodles will only include games in your child’s Toybox that respect your settings.

Why we built it

If you do a Google search for “violence filter,” you’ll quickly realize what a huge need there’s been for something like this.  A combination of all the filters out there will probably get you something that filters gambling sites, pornography, adware, pop-ups, chatrooms, and even social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace.  All this and more, but not violence.  And even if, after hours of searching, you found one, it would predictably be just like the others – essentially a big on-off switch.  With issues like gambling and pornography, an on-off switch probably makes sense.  But with violence, there are wildly varying opinions on what’s appropriate and what’s not appropriate for children of different ages.

It comes down to this.  Parents have preferences when it comes to the media that their children consume, whether it’s their book at bedtime, the show on TV, or their favorite site online.  When it comes to movies, parents have no choice but to rely on the G-PG-PG-13 rating system developed by the Motion Picture Association.  It’s not great, but it’s something.  It’s a universal standard that all shows and movies are held accountable to.

There’s no equivalent universal rating system for your child’s media content online.  So how can a parent feel confident that their children are safe? The answer is, they don’t.  They let their kids go online, but with the deep, nagging fear (only worsening as their kids grow older) that something will slip through -  that new content will be put on the site, or that their kids will wander somewhere new, somewhere they don’t belong.  Even the parents who do their fair share of homework screening sites ultimately have to take a leap of faith about what brands they can trust, and can only hope that they live up to their kid-friendly promises.

Here at Zoodles we’ve taken it upon ourselves to be the place online you can trust.  Any time we add content to Zoodles, we take into consideration its educational value, its entertainment value, and its appropriateness for children.  But even a team of thousands would fall short in knowing your child as well as you do.  Parents know best.  That’s why we not only pre-screen all our content and restrict your child to these pre-approved sites, but we give you sublime control over what parts of this content make it through to your child.  The violence filter is one more step in this direction.  The way it’s been designed is simple:  We tell you how we rate the games, and you choose what rating level you think is appropriate for your child.  We take care of the rest.

To try the violence filter out for yourself, visit the Parent Dashboard under Education and Parental Controls. As always, let us know what you think!

We’re happy to welcome two new members to the Zoodles Education Team, Jason and Yaa!  Content is king in the Zoodles world, and the Education Team is our front line in ensuring that the games on Zoodles are the best of the best.  Whether your family uses Zoodles for entertainment, education, or both combined, it’s the quality of our team and the strength of their experience that makes Zoodles the go-to web destination for parents and children alike.  We’re very proud to have Jason and Yaa join our team, and we look forward to getting the games they’ve reviewed in front of kids everywhere!

Jason Azicri holds a BA in Psychology from the University of Central Florida and an MA in Counseling Psychology from Santa Clara University. Jason was a Special Needs Health and Health teacher in Miami before relocating to CA. He also co-created an educational film series called Adina’s Deck because he believes young people need more empowering messages and positive portrayals of young teens in film and television. Jason sees Zoodles as another opportunity to further help bring great educational content to kids. He currently also counsels at two high schools and continues to write screenplays.

Yaa Cuguano has a lifelong interest in how learning can be tailored to learners in order to provide them with effective learning experiences and environments.  She is also interested in second and third language learning and inquiry based learning.  She is currently pursuing a master’s degree at Stanford’s School of Education with a specialization in Learning Design and Technology.  She is excited to be a part of the Education Team and contribute to the great work being done at Zoodles.

In an earlier post, we talked about all the ways that parents set screen time limits at home.  Whether they’re using the DVR to dole out episodes of Dora, or printing out sticker charts to make their kids play outside, different parents have different ways of handling their desire to limit the amount of media their children consume.

Introducing the Zoodles Play Timer!

That is why we’re pleased to present the Zoodles Play Timer,  a new feature that will help parents set the time limits they want, without the hassle of maintaining them or explaining and reexplaining them to their ever-desirous kids.

With the Zoodles play timer, you can limit your child’s time online without having to constantly step in and feel like the bad guy.  Zoodles does all the negotiating for you – as soon as your child’s time on Zoodles runs out, a big blue clock will appear signaling their time is up.  The browser stays locked in full-screen mode, so your child can’t wander somewhere else online or click around on the computer.  After a minute or so, they’ll be brought back to the original family log-in screen, so the brother or sister who’s been patiently waiting in the wings can get a turn!

Of course, no kid likes to be cut off cold turkey, so we’ve built in some friendly purple reminders that time is winding down.   With 10 minute, 5 minute, and 2 minute warnings, Zoodles eases your child off the computer and on to a new activity without the tantrum.  The wind-down process is important for every child to learn, and all parents know how painful this process can be if it’s not done artfully!

You can set time limits in half hour increments anywhere from half an hour a day to 8 hours a day, and you can set them differently based on whether it’s a weekday, or a weekend.  What’s more, each of your children have their own unique play timer settings, so you can limit them differently based on their individual play patterns!

We hope that you’ll enjoy this new feature, and all the ways that it strives to make your life easier!  As always, please let us know what you think once you’ve gotten a chance to try it out!

I spent a large part of last week at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.  While I love gadgets and new technology, I was drawn to CES this year by the Kids@Play conference held at CES.  I had the pleasure of speaking on a panel about internet safety for children and to demo Zoodles.  The panel and demo went very well, but the thing I came back from CES most excited about is all the enabling technologies that are going to improve the lives of children around the world!

Tablet computers, 3-D display technologies and touch screen interfaces are just a few of the technologies at the show that can be used to create compelling educational experiences.    I am looking forward to all the innovation that will come in the near future and excited to be part of a company that is trying to create those compelling experiences for children and parents.

Best,

Mark

In the spirit of the new year, Zoodles is proud to announce a new interface for older kids!

With the new interface, we hope to give older Zoodles kids (ages 6+) more ways to find the content that they want.  Notice the new look and feel of the tabs at the top – including new destinations like Subjects, Characters, and Animals.  Each of these tabs leads to different categories of games and activities.

Inside of Subjects, we’ve divided our games into 9 groups:  Action Games, Art Games, Board Games, Brain Games, Math Games, Puzzle Games, Science Games, Sports Games, and Word Games.  Hopefully not just one, but many of these areas, will appeal to your young ones!

Within the Characters tab, we’ve given your child easy access to games from all the shows and characters that they know and love.

Lastly, we’ve created an Animals tab, a fun new way for families to think about the educational games on Zoodles!

What’s your favorite tab so far? If you haven’t been back to Zoodles in a while, now’s the time to come on by! And as always, please be sure to send us your feedback and help us improve. We hope you’ll enjoy this new Zoodles experience!

Visit our blog next week to read about Zoodles’ trip to CES, the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas!  (And if you happen to be in the area, swing by Kids at Play to say hello!)

What a year!

With the close of 2009, Zoodles marks its first year as a company! 2009 has treated us well: we’ve seen the growth and development of our team, our product, and most importantly, our network of families and supporters. We couldn’t have asked for a better first year, or a better group of people to help ring in our second. Who knows what 2010 has in store…but we’re turning one! It’s time to celebrate!

Being a parent, like most of you, my last couple of weeks have been incredibly busy.  With family visiting, gifts to purchase, and work to be done I forgot to blog…. sorry about that!  I want to take this moment to wish you and your little ones a happy holidays!  We hope all of your child’s dreams came true and that the holidays were relaxing and enjoyable to you.

Best,

Mark

Give the Gift of Zoodles!

We’re kicking off this holiday season by asking all our friends and family to consider sharing Zoodles as a gift with loved ones big and small!   Zoodles is truly the gift that keeps on giving, as it harnesses the power of the Internet and stays unbeatably fresh with the best educational content on the web.

Whether it’s Zhu Zhu pets, a new Lego set, or the latest Leapfrog game, no gift has better staying power than Zoodles.  As every Toybox gets filled daily with new games and activities, Zoodles will continue to entertain and educate your loved ones’ children long after the holidays are through.

And children aren’t the only ones who benefit! With the gift of Zoodles, you provide parents with unmatched insights into their child’s latest interests, and complete control over their child’s safety online.

You’ve experienced the joy of Zoodles yourself, now reach out to friends and family and share with them an award-winning product with long-lasting benefits.

Give the Gift of Zoodles!

Scholastic is a household name in education, and we’re happy to announce that Zoodles now features some great games from their site!  Scholastic has done a fantastic job creating content that is fun and educational, basing their games on popular books and characters that your children know and love.  Nothing more satisfying than using the appeal of Harry Potter and Captain Underpants to indulge the literary senses of kids around the world!  Here are the top 5 Scholastic picks from our always amazing Education Team:

Virtual Forest Challenge

Your child learns ways to recycle and the importance of helping the environment by clicking on different places in the community and answering questions in the form of a quiz.

Write a Dreadful Act

Your child learns about grammar and parts of speech by filling in a Mad-libs type form and creating their own story.

Masterpiece Match

Your child learns about different artists by matching each artist’s description to his/her painting.

Dinosaur Cove

Your child explores and engages with the virtual dinosaur environment by making decisions about which rocks to turn over in search of dragonflies, fossils, and other objects.

Balloon Bust

Your child develops fine motor skills and a basic understanding of motion while timing darts to pop balloons.

Zoodles is proud to announce the release of a major new feature, ad-blocking!  With Zoodles ad-blocking enabled, children will no longer be exposed to ads within the Zoodles browser.

Since the founding of the company we have heard over and over again from parents that the advertising their children are subjected to results in parents being less comfortable putting their children online.  As a parent I feel the same way and I have personally found many of the ads that are displayed on sites for children not only annoying, but in some cases disturbing.  Here are a few examples of ads that we have found on sites for children:

Just look at this Nissan ad we found on a popular gaming site!  Do they really think 7 year olds are interested in cash back on a sedan?

What parent wants their child playing a game described as “Action Shooter Meets Gang Themed MMO”… much less even looking at the ad!:

And finally, here is an ad I am happy that my daughter will now never see again -  Hugh Hefner with partially dressed women promoting a video game!  Not the example I want to set for my 5 year old daughter!

I am happy to state that all of these ads will be blocked by the new and improved Zoodles browser!

Blocking advertising from children will also result in their ability to better concentrate on the games and activities they are trying to perform.  A child who is playing a challenging math game won’t have to waste working memory on the giant flashing advertisement next to the game, they will be able to use all their cognitive abilities on learning!

Below is an image that shows the difference the Zoodles ad-blocker can make.  The screen shot on the left shows a game from Nick Jr. with all the advertisements highlighted in red while the screen shot on the right shows the same game with the Zoodles ad-blocking enabled.  Notice all the sections of the screenshot on the right that are highlighted green… these are where the ads used to be. For those you counting, yes if you counted correctly… there were 8 ads on the original page!

Here is another game for children showing the before and after effects of Zoodles blocking ads targeted to children.

With over 18 advertisements targeted to children in the above screen shot you can really see the effect of removing ads from the child’s experience.

I want to thank the entire team for working hard on building this new Premium Feature, especially Michael on our engineering team!  Every family who signs-up for Zoodles will get a free trial of the Zoodles Premium Membership and they can test this feature out for themselves.  For any of you parents out there that find ads still showing up in Zoodles, just let us know and we will hunt them down and find a way to block them!

So if you hate advertisements targeted toward children be sure to tell your friends about Zoodles and how we block advertisements from kids!

How does one top working on some of the most popular web products in the world like Google Maps and Gmail?  Well, you come to work at Zoodles of course!  I am pleased to announce that Dave Young, who spent the last 3.5 years at Google has joined us here at Zoodles to lead up our product design efforts.  Dave has a strong track record of creating compelling user experiences and I am really excited to have him join the team!  Here is a little more formal write-up about Dave’s background:

Dave Young has joined Zoodles to lead our Product Design as we expand our offerings to provide new online experiences that are fun and easy to use.  Dave comes to us from Google where he was a User Experience Designer on Google Maps, Google Trends, Google Docs, OpenSocial, Sharing, Google Moderator, Gmail and Adwords. Prior to Google Dave also worked as a User Experience Designer for Scholastic.com and was a Teachers Assistant for Kindergarten, Pre-K and Preschool at a Reggio Emilia™ school. Dave attended Carnegie Mellon University where he completed a BFA in “Communication Design” and a MS in “Human Computer Interaction”.

Welcome Dave!

One of the great things about starting a company like Zoodles in Silicon Valley is the proximity to Stanford University.  Stanford students and graduates are incredibly bright and hard working, so when it came time to build our education team, we knew we wanted to fill it with graduates from Stanford who focused on education.  Before telling you a bit about each member of the team I want to share with you a little bit about the work the team does.

One of the first tasks the team took on was to dissect and understand both national and state educational standards.  We infused these standards into the Zoodles product which means that we are able to appropriately target games to children based on their age / grade level as well as their specific abilities (e.g. – ability to read).  With this understanding of educational standards the team then scoured the web finding the best games for children and tagging them appropriately.  In short, this team is responsible for ensuring that Zoodles has the most fun & educational content possible for children!  As you will see, we have an incredibly talented and highly qualified team for this task and reading through their bios should give you both a sense of comfort about who is screening content for your children as well as a sense of how seriously we take our role as curators of your child’s internet experience.

Rachel Yong started working at Zoodles back in January while also enrolled in Stanford’s Masters Program in Learning, Design, and Technology.  After five years at Stanford (including her undergrad), she is glad to say that she’s finally graduated!  With a passion for using technology to help kids learn, you can imagine what a perfect fit Zoodles is for her. Working on the Zoodles Education Team has been a huge pleasure, both because she’s had the privilege of meeting Debbie and Nicole – extreme content experts – but also because she’s had the chance to start building her own expertise in the domain.  For example, she can confidently say that she now knows the national and state standards better than the back of her hand!  Even more importantly, she’s had the chance to really think about how to structure Zoodles so the games kids play can truly adapt to them and complement their natural cognitive and emotional development.

It’s hard to choose her favorite games after poring over so many great ones, but she can easily say which games she has personally spent playing – “off duty,” of course! – and those would be Fantastic Contraption and Untangle.  For kicks, she’ll also throw in the Most Grating Branded Characters (Based on Laugh), and they would be Dora the Explorer and Curious George…by a LANDSLIDE.

Debbie Heimowitz has been part of the education team at Zoodles for the past seven months. Her background is creating educational films (including the Adina’s Deck series), as well as working at Disney Channel and Warner Bros. She loves discovering new games and videos that are both fun and educational! The most important thing is that kids are having fun while they are learning, which is her favorite part about Zoodles (and, of course, the amazing team!). The ratings and educational features are custom tailored to each child and parent- how cool is that! Debbie holds a Master’s degree in Education from Stanford University and Bachelors degree in Film Studies from UC Berkeley. In addition to Zoodles, Debbie creates & works in children’s films/tv, and teaches 5th/6th grade at a performing arts school. She hopes you are enjoying Zoodles and that you will check back frequently for new updates!

Nicole Holthuis has many years of experience as a teacher (high school biology), teacher educator, curriculum developer, educational researcher and evaluator.  She did her undergraduate work at UC Davis in Biology and then continued on at Stanford where she earned a Master’s degree and PhD in education.  She has had the opportunity to apply her skills to classrooms and non-profit programs around the Bay Area, with a focus on improving science curriculum and instruction in heterogeneous classrooms.

Nicole joined the Zoodles team about six months ago and is having a blast switching gears from a focus on learning that happens in the classrooms to learning that happens at home on the computer  She has three children, ages 8, 10, and 12, so she has first-hand knowledge of the challenges of finding safe, quality content on the web that her children will enjoy and learn from.  “One of my favorite things about working at Zoodles is the opportunity it gives me to discover some amazing websites.  There are some really poorly developed educational games and activities out there but there are so many real gems that are fun, stimulating and incredibly educational.  In particular, I tend to get completely caught up in the logic,  problem-solving, and spatial reasoning games that I have been reviewing.  Don’t tell Mark but I’d probably get more work done if some of these sites weren’t so darn challenging yet fun.”  You can check out some of Nicole’s favorites: Stained Glass and Line Rider on Zoodles.

Sometimes getting your kids to read can feel a lot like pulling teeth.  After a long day of school, they might try to convince you that “learning time” is over.  So how do we make “learning time” fun again?  How do we make learning so fun that kids don’t even realize they’re learning, and become eager to learn all the time?

Here at Zoodles we realized that we have a TON of information about how to make this possible.  After all, we have a huge number of kids playing in Zoodles every day, and they’re all learning without even knowing it!  We decided to take a deep dive into our data and see what reading games Zoodles kids have been playing on, and which of them have emerged as the tried-and-true Top 5 Most Fun.  For this study, we focused on kids ages 5 – 6, since the early reading experience (in school and at home) is so critical to a child’s academic success and can even predict reading achievement through 6th grade.  The “funness” of a game was determined by how long kids generally spent playing the game.

Let us know if your kids play these, or other, favorites!

1) Save a Baby Dinosaur!

Your child develops the basics in reading sight words while helping the Wonder Pets save a baby triceratops.

Educational value: Book and Print Basics, Early Reading / Phonics, Sight Words, Reading Comprehension, Elements of a Story

2) What’s In the Bag?

Your child develops logic, matching, and vocabulary skills by listening to a series of words and then choosing the object that those words describe.

Educational Value: Vocabulary and Concept Development, Word Meanings

3) ABC Match

Your child develops early reading and memory skills by matching pictures with the first letter of their name.

Educational Value: Early Reading / Phonics, Matching Letters to Sounds, Decoding and Word Recognition, Syllables / Word Parts

4) Lumpy and Roo, and a Mystery Too!

Your child develops reading skills as well as investigation and matching skills by reading along and solving the mystery.

Educational Value: Reading Comprehension, Elements of a Story

5) Word World

Your child develops spelling skills while using letters to build words.

Educational Value: Early Reading / Phonics, Matching letters to sounds, Spelling, Vowels and Consonants

All the Zoodles-approved games listed here are accessible from a 5- or 6-year-old’s Zoodles Toybox!

Las Madres, a great local parenting group, held an event last night at the San Jose Children’s Discovery Museum.  My wife & I first got involved with Las Madres when we moved to the Bay Area over 3 years ago, and we found the events and playgroups incredibly useful.  In fact, we met many of our good friends in the area through Las Madres.  So last night was a great night – Zoodles was an exhibitor at one of their family events and we had a chance to show Zoodles to both children and parents.  As the picture shows, we had three computers running Zoodles so children could come over and play and I am happy to report that children were engaged the entire evening (actually we had some children still playing 40 minutes after the event officially ended!).

By the way, if you live in the Bay Area, or travel here with family, I highly recommend the Children’s Discovery Museum.  They have lots of great exhibits for both children and parents.  My daughters and I *really* love the Water Works section, and my wife likes to point out that it was built for young children but I am normally the adult there who is having as much fun, if not more fun, than the children.

My daughter Abbie (pictured left with me at her “preschool graduation hoedown”), like many 5 year olds, loves to play on the computer.  She first showed an interest in the computer after watching my wife, Tara, and I use our laptops.  At the age of one and a half she would toddle over and want to simply bang on the keyboard (kids love to mimic their parents!).  One of her birthday gifts when she turned 2 was a custom “kid’s keyboard” along with some CD-ROM games that taught some of the most basic of concepts – color recognition, shape recognition, and simple cause & effect.  She really loved playing on the computer, and so when her fine motor skills progressed she had her first taste of the internet – PBSKids.  While she loved being on the computer, she would also exhibit signs of frustration and every 15 – 20 minutes we would invariably get called into help her with some computer problem.

Last fall I had a chance to sit down and really observe Abbie on the computer and it was clear that her online experience was broken:

• Abbie would constantly bump into games that weren’t age or skill level appropriate – for example some games would start with written instructions that she couldn’t read
• The browser interface for children is a mess – Abbie would would accidentally close a tab in the browser, minimize the browser, or click on the “Start” button in Windows
• Veteran internet users have found a way to “tune out” the bright motion based ads on a page, but those are magnets for children, which would result in Abbie clicking on ads and having her land on some random site… frustrating for her, and scary for me
• Once Abbie got bored of one site she had no way of switching to another site without calling out for help

While Abbie’s experience as a child was painful, I think I was in as much pain as a parent watching this, but often for different reasons:

• The mind of a child is a sponge, and I was frustrated by the fact that Abbie was clearly receptive to learning through online games and activities, but the games she was interacting with weren’t targeted toward her cognitive abilities (she was migrating from letter recognition to early reading skills)
• With ads on most kid games sites I was worried about what Abbie might stumble into after a few clicks online
• Abbie’s favorite character at that point in her life was Dora the Explorer, and while I was ok with her playing Dora the Explorer games I really didn’t want her playing with the Wonder Pets because she started mimicking one of the character’s speech impediments (having grown up with a speech impediment myself this was something I wanted to stop quickly!)

I quickly started looking for a product that could solve these problems, and to my dismay there simply weren’t any products designed for younger children that solved these problem.  After talking to other parents it was clear to me that millions of parents were all looking for a safe way for their children to get online and have an engaging and educational experience.

It didn’t take long to convince Rich, my co-founder and technical mastermind behind Zoodles, that this was an important and meaningful problem to solve.  We started Zoodles with the intent of not only creating a better online experience for children, but a safe, engaging and educational experience that kids would love and parents would value.  In future posts we will talk a bit more about the Zoodles offering, but understanding our motivation for starting Zoodles will put those posts into better context.

- Mark Williamson (co-founder and CEO of Zoodles)