1. International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction ( ) –
Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect
International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijcci
Child–computer interaction
J.C. Reada,∗
, P. Markopoulosb,1
a
Child Computer Interaction Group, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, PR1 2HE, United Kingdom
b
Department of Industrial Design, Eindhoven University of Technology, P.O. Box 513, Den Dolech 2, Eindhoven, 5600 MB, The Netherlands
Child–Computer Interaction (CCI) is an area of scientific inves-
tigation that concerns the phenomena surrounding the interaction
between children and computational and communication tech-
nologies. It combines inputs and perspectives from multiple scien-
tific disciplines informing and supporting an area of research and
industrial practice that concerns the design of interactive systems
for children. In 2011, Read and Bekker [1] referred to CCI as the
‘‘study of the Activities, Behaviours, Concerns and Abilities of Chil-
dren as they interact with computer technologies, often with the
intervention of others (mainly adults) in situations that they par-
tially (but generally do not fully) control and regulate’’. The chil-
dren of interest in CCI are primarily aged between five and twelve
but the community reaches out in both directions with toddlers
and teenagers being increasingly considered in academic work
[1–4].
Whilst being multidisciplinary, (incorporating psychology, and
especially developmental psychology, learning sciences, product
and interaction design, computer science, media studies, and game
design), and with having authors publishing in all these venues
and taking a range of research approaches, CCI takes most of
its inspiration from Human–Computer Interaction (HCI). HCI is
similarly multidisciplinary, and itself is constantly changing and
thus the allegiance seems very natural. HCI initially emerged from
the ergonomics and socio-technical research agendas and started
as a subfield of computer science but has since incorporated inputs
from multiple fields including cognitive science, social psychology,
linguistics, etc. The increasing penetration of computing in the
70’s and 80’s that shifted from research labs to people’s offices
and homes, meant that computers were not to be operated by
specially trained personnel but by all and thus emphasis changed
towards the need to understand how to design systems that were
easy to learn, use, and maintain—key aspects of what came to be
known as usability [5]. In more recent times, the initial focus on
usability of a computationally enabled artefact has been gradually
subsumed by a range of more refined and specialised theoretical
constructs and pertinent design concerns relating to the different
ways technology can serve people, e.g., for entertainment [6],
∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +44 1772 893285.
E-mail addresses: jcread@uclan.ac.uk (J.C. Read), p.markopoulos@tue.nl
(P. Markopoulos).
1 Tel.: +31 40 247 5247.
communication [7], commerce [8], education [9], etc. Concepts of
interest to this community include for example, trust in online
systems [10], perceptions of privacy and the nature of privacy
needs in a networked world [11], and the hedonic aspects of
using products and emerging user experience [12,13]. This trend
towards diversity of uses, use contexts and purposes and the
need to develop more specialised theoretical apparatus and design
knowledge means also that special attention needs to be paid to
segments of the population who were initially not considered but
are now acquiring a growing importance as users of computational
and communication technologies.
Children are one of these user groups. Children now grow up
immersed in technology to a level that keeps surprising earlier
generations, but which, to them, is simply an inherent element
of their habitat. Although this immersion is largely dependent on
wealth and circumstance, it is certainly the case that children are
frequently users and increasingly owners of personal computers,
game consoles, personal music technologies and mobile phones
[14]. More than ever before, technology manufacturers and service
providers are turning their attention to children as a growing
market segment. Even more important, societies are becoming
concerned to ensure that appropriate products and services,
namely those that can support development and enhance well-
being, are being made available for children. Whatever motivates
the design of interactive technology for children, it is clear that
there is an urgent and present need for research in the design
of interactive products for children, related methodology, as well
as a scientific account of the interaction between children and
technology.
The remainder of this paper is delivered in two sections. The
first section outlines Child–Computer Interaction as it currently
is by looking back to its beginnings, by identifying its three
overarching concerns and then by providing a snapshot of current
research foci. The following section looks forward by considering
where CCI could, and perhaps should, go. In this section some of the
current gaps and emerging themes are identified before it closes
with some key challenges for the CCI community of researchers
and practitioners.
1. What is CCI?
We shall not attempt to trace the first scientific studies of
technology use by children or the first reports of designing and
2212-8689/$ – see front matter © 2012 Published by Elsevier B.V.
doi:10.1016/j.ijcci.2012.09.001

2. 2 J.C. Read, P. Markopoulos / International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction ( ) –
developing relevant technologies. Suffice to say, that these predate
the fields of Child–Computer Interaction and Human–Computer
Interaction, as the potential of computational technology for
children was recognised well before the eighties. It is worth
however reviewing some of these early works, and especially those
that have become a reference point and common ground for the CCI
community.
One of the most visionary and influential individuals impacting
this field is Seymour Papert. As early as the sixties he started
investigating how children could use and benefit from computing.
Well-known products of his work were the Logo programming
language, [15] and later on the Lego Mindstorms product line
(mindstrorms.lego.com)—a toy construction kit which allowed
children to build and program their own robots. Working closely
with the Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget and extending his
constructivist learning theories [16], Papert went on to develop
a highly influential theory of learning called constructionism
which is embodied in the design of products like Logo and the
Lego Mindstorms, but which also presented a novel and multi-
faceted approach to science education [17]. Papert recognised the
opportunity that computers presented to allow children to learn in
relation to their own interests. A core element of constructionism
is to support children to become authors and creators, rather than
passive recipients, of educational content, and by extension, other
media for children [18]. This view, which is widely endorsed in
the Child–Computer Interaction community, is still as radical today
as it was in the sixties when one considers educational systems
worldwide. At the same time, recent developments regarding open
source communities, wiki technologies, game editors, etc., are
making this vision much more realistic and widely accessible than
during the early days of this field.
The most direct and immediate follow up of Papert’s work
is the Lifelong Kindergarten research program led by Mitchel
Resnick at MIT, which examines how constructionist learning
can be implemented in technologies and educational practices
[19]. A variety of educational tools supporting constructionist
learning have resulted from this program, most notably the Scratch
language that children can use to create animations, video games,
and interactive art [20]. Yasmin Kafai, one of the initial design
team for Scratch and currently at UCLA, went on to examine how
children could learn by creating computer games [21], a position
that has influenced educational initiatives in several countries
and has become increasingly accepted since. Around the same
time Soloway et al. [22] proposed Learner Centred Design as an
approach for designing for children embedding learning as a core
topic for designers of interactive products. The debate regarding
gender and children’s technology was considered by Kafai [23] and
Justine Cassell who argued how gender stereotypes are manifested
in computer games for children and how current toys and games
help reproduce them [24]. Cassel later became broadly known
for her work on embodied conversational agents [25], which
examined how such computational agents with some physical or
graphical embodiment are capable of engaging in conversation
with humans using both verbal and non-verbal means common
to human–human communication. Such technologies can be
very useful for story telling applications, a type of application
that has been especially interesting for the CCI community, see
[26–28]. By the turn of the millennium, the diversity of products
and applications studied by researchers that were intended for
children had grown to include, digital libraries [29], drawing and
editing programs [30], games [31], communication technologies
[32], educational multimedia [33], etc.
This general trend to design technologies that address chil-
dren’s needs and interests that help them learn, play, and develop,
have been matched by a growing recognition that both interac-
tive technology and design methodologies developed in the field of
Human–Computer Interaction for adult users needs to be adapted
when children are involved.
Early research on interactive technology examined how chil-
dren performed as users of mainstream technologies developed
for adults and in doing so revealed a need for some specialist de-
sign / adaptations for child users. For example Jones [34] evaluated
the performance of children aged 6, 8, and 10, using mice, joystick
or trackball, and found surprisingly low performance by children,
but also indicated the superiority of the mouse as a pointing de-
vice. Revelle and Strommen [35] also found that the mouse was
superior for younger children but only after practice. Inkpen com-
pared point-and-click to drag and drop, finding the first interaction
style faster, with fewer errors and with higher satisfaction from the
young users [36]. Font sizes for children reading were investigated
by Mills and Weldon [37] and speech recognition for children was
studied by Mostow et al. [38]. Interestingly, over the last decade,
some of these, once significant results, have been challenged in
light of changes in technology and changes in children themselves.
For example, the recommendations for font sizes for reading were
gathered from poor quality screens and make no sense with con-
temporary mobile devices, and changes in children; children now
appear to expect drag and drop rather than point and click [39].
Recognising that in some cases, adult technologies might need
changing for children, but also recognising that children as users
deserve products and techniques that are designed for them, with
their needs in mind, more recent work has attempted to design
tailored devices that fit the capabilities and activities of children.
For example, Hourcade proposed Point-Assist, a mouse that adapts
its speed for individual children according to the difficulty of
the pointing task which is ascertained from sub-movements
[40]. New technologies like tangible interfaces and interactive
tabletops have been enthusiastically studied by CCI researchers
with studies arguing that tangibles, using children’s natural skills,
are well suited to children [41] and that they support cooperation,
[42,43]. Multi-touch, tabletop displays have been shown to be well
suited to young children’s play [44,45] and can prompt design
thinking [46].
Parallel to studies of interaction technology, a significant
part of the Child–Computer Interaction research has focused on
methodology, as the community has sought to find out how best
to design and evaluate products with and for children. An early
example was the widely known and well cited publication by
Hanna et al. [47] that examined how standard usability testing
practices, as used in industrial contexts, need to be adapted
for children users. A line of research seeking age appropriate
evaluation methodologies followed including work on examining
verbalisation methods [48], new insights on survey methods
[49,50] and modifications to interview techniques [50]; see [51] for
an extensive introduction to a wide collection of related methods.
Apart from evaluation, there has been a growing body of work
focusing on methods suitable for early design where children
act as informants to the design process, e.g., [52]. Following the
broader socio-technical and participatory design thinking that
runs through the discipline of Human–Computer Interaction, a
substantial body of research now examines how children can be
involved in the design process [53–57]. Most notably in this area,
Allison Druin has consistently advocated the need to change the
role of a child from a passive user of products designed by adults to
an active participant and stakeholder in the design process, which
is a core tenet of her cooperative inquiry method [58].
Current research themes in CCI include considerations of
interaction techniques [59], evaluation methods [50], and design
practice [60]. Additionally there is still a lively interest in
developing and evaluating applications that support learning—
including tabletop learning [61], learning with tangibles [62–64]
and the use of e-books [65,66]. Mobile learning [67,68] and the

3. J.C. Read, P. Markopoulos / International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction ( ) – 3
broader aspects of mobile living with children are themes that are
still current (see [69] for a selection of papers in this area)—some
of this work is targeted to children in areas where mobile phones
are the core technology for internet access [70]. Environments
that promote programming and manipulation – continuing the
legacy of Papert – continue to be designed and evaluated by the
CCI community with programmable blocks, fun desktop physics
and electronic craft being examples of the diversity in this space
[71–73]. There is considerable work around supporting family
communication [74,75] especially for dis-located families and this,
as well as the on going increase in internet enabled devices, has
opened up an interest in privacy, trust and security and what that
means to and for children [76]. Children with special needs and
children who are marginalised are constantly being designed for
by the CCI community with examples from [77–79].
2. Where next
In looking out towards the future, two approaches are taken.
The first is to bring together key observations, articulated as
concerns, from four review papers from CCI, the second is to
imagine the future landscape.
The four review papers collectively highlight concerns around
delivering a mass of knowledge, identifying the role of context,
improving research methods and their reporting, and clarifying
values.
There is considered to be a shortfall in CCI of empirical work
to ‘back up’ the beliefs of the researchers working in it. A recent
review of work on tangible user interfaces for children [80]
examined how the widely held beliefs of researchers in this
community regarding the advantages of tangible user interfaces
in terms of usability, learning, collaboration and entertainment,
have so far not been sufficiently supported by empirical research. It
argued however for the need for design driven research to explore
such opportunities and to examine relevant design concerns in the
context of realistic design problems.
Much of the work in CCI has failed to adequately take account
of the ‘other actors’ and the other contexts in the space. In the
review paper by Read and Bekker [1], the behaviour and roles of
children, but also of gatekeepers, was highlighted as something
relatively unique to CCI. The CCI community has begun to better
consider home and play contexts but to a large extent, the work
so far has remained focussed around classroom and educational
settings with the roles of parents and siblings being understudied.
Methods still need to be developed that can robustly be used to
study phenomena in CCI, The review of research methods by Jensen
and Skov [81] demonstrated that in most cases CCI researchers use
methods that are not adapted for children, that in many instances
adaptations are very localised and that authors are sometimes lax
in describing the methods used. Due to its multidisciplinary nature,
CCI will always use a myriad of methods but a challenge for the
community is both to understand and apply these methods with
rigour whilst also being mindful of the individual needs of the child
participants.
This need to consider children, and their participation, leads
to the findings of the fourth review paper, by Yarosh et al. [82]
which examined the values held by CCI researchers in terms of the
stated values, as found in the papers, and the reported values as
disclosed by an interview study. All too often researchers in CCI fail
to identify, and then to disclose, their real motivations for the work
they do and the ethics of their approaches and their work is not
made clear. A core value for the field of Child–Computer Interaction
is that the interests of children are represented and respected in
the research and design processes.
3. In the future
In the future, children, their technologies and therefore their
lives, will be very different than they are now.
In terms of technologies, history tells us that some of what
is being researched now will come rapidly into the marketplace.
Tangible interfaces which appeared in the research literature in the
mid-nineties are by now widely available commercial products.
Robots are also widely available commercially though they have
not yet received broad adoption. Smartboards and interactive
tablets are now in children’s homes and classrooms. Wearable,
organic and invisible interactions are just around the corner.
Children are also changing. Next to their individual develop-
ment one can easily observe changes between different cohorts.
The first set of children who were born and grew up with dig-
ital technologies, have reached adulthood shortly after the turn
of the millennium, the generations that follow, have not known a
world without mobile phones, social media, and Wikipedia. These
changes between cohorts mean that children have different capa-
bilities for, and expectations from, related technologies and will
approach innovation and their participation in design processes in
radically different ways.
The social landscape for children is altered by the technologies
and services they use but also by changes in the environments
around them. Learning is no longer delivered exclusively by an
adult expert or instructor, knowledge is gathered in from multiple
sources, parenting is facilitated by networked applications and
parents and children communicate, at distance and near hand,
using a myriad of technologies—this always on and always
available technological eco-system changes the way children plan
and organise their days. Attitudes to products, services, risk,
security and friendship are all changing.
In the future, therefore, children will have technologies and
will be in places that cannot yet be imagined. Thus, one of the
key challenges for the Child–Computer Interaction Community
is to provide a body of research to ‘better inform’ the designs
of those technologies and the ‘shape’ of those spaces. Clearly
empirical work, design driven research and the development of
robust methods are all needed but in addition the field would be
well served by taking on some key challenges in order to ensure it
does the best for the children of tomorrow.
– Challenge 1 – Closer link of Theory to Design. Papert and Piaget
were theorists. In the enthusiasm to build cool things and create
dynamic fun installations, the CCI community has perhaps
forgotten some of its roots. Despite the abundance of work
on child development, educational theories and perspectives
on interaction design, the link between such theoretical works
and interaction design practice is at best tenuous. Models and
guidelines that could guide the design of interactive artefacts
for children are few and far between; on the one hand this
reflects a shift of the general HCI community away from
reductionism and its turn to practice; on the other it reflects the
relevant scarcity of empirical research on children to develop
models that can guide design.
– Challenge 2 – Children and their Participation. In social sciences,
a considerable debate has raged around the way children
participate in their work. Participation of children, as social
actors, as designers and as users is understudied and under
explored in CCI. Transcending issues of accessibility, research
in Child–Computer Interaction can explore new opportunities
offered by interactive technology to support the development
of varying groups of children, to support their participation in
the design process and their emancipation as stakeholders in
technology design.

4. 4 J.C. Read, P. Markopoulos / International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction ( ) –
– Challenge 3 – Supporting ‘Family’ Communication, Play and
Learning. Play and learning have been a traditional focus of
the Child–Computer Interaction community. The emergence
of mobile and pervasive technologies, tangible and embodied
interaction has created an immense space of opportunities
that is yet to be explored especially in the context of bringing
families, in the broadest sense, into playful learning and
communication spaces. Relevant design explorations need
to be matched by child and family appropriate technology
development, and methods to support the design of related
applications.
– Challenge 4 – Stories in the Cloud. Storytelling has been a fea-
ture of CCI research since its early days. Initially concerned with
writing and retelling stories in text spaces, the new stories are
amalgams of digital snippets. Children are major users of social
media and a large part of research in this community explores
appropriate communication technologies, for communicating
with collocated and remote friends, for communicating and
socialising with family. Privacy, security and trust, risk and risk
taking are all features of this environment but so are concerns
about memories and keepsakes as children and those around
them only capture and keep digital scents as opposed to ‘boxes
of physical stuff’.
4. Conclusion
This paper has summarised the state of Child–Computer
Interaction by providing a literature review of the field and by
bringing out key themes, evaluation, design, research methods, key
concerns, for more empirical work, for an expanded context, for
improved methods and for a focus on values and key challenges,
for a focus on theory, for a better understanding of participation, for
family centred interaction and for a return to storytelling, albeit in a
vastly digital space. The authors present these challenges, concerns
and themes in a hierarchy that will allow others to identify a place
in which to work.
References
[1] J.C. Read, M.M. Bekker, The Nature of Child Computer Interaction, in: Paper
Presented at the HCI2011, Newcastle, UK, 2011.
[2] O.S. Iversen, R.S. Smith, Scandinavian participatory design: dialogic curation
with teenagers, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 11th
International Conference on Interaction Design and Children, Bremen,
Germany, 2012.
[3] B. Hengeveld, R. Voort, C. Caroline Hummels, K. Overbeeke, J. de Moor,
H. van Balkom, LinguaBytes, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 7th
International Conference on Interaction Design and Children, Chicago, Illinois,
2008.
[4] J. Marco, E. Cerezo, S. Baldasarri, E. Mazzone, J.C. Read, User-oriented design
and tangible interaction for kindergarten children, in: Paper Presented at the
8th International Conference of Interaction Design and Children, Como, Italy,
2009.
[5] J.D. Gould, C.H. Lewis, Designing for usability: key principles and what
designers think, Communications of the ACM 28 (3) (1985) 300–311.
[6] J. Burke, J. Friedman, E. Mendelowitz, H. Park, M.B. Srivastava, Embedding
expression: pervasive computing architecture for art and entertainment,
Pervasive and Mobile Computing 2 (1) (2006) 1–36.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pmcj.2005.07.002.
[7] K. Stenning, C. Gurr, Human- formalism interaction: studies in communication
through formalism, Interacting with Computers 9 (1997) 111–128.
[8] P. Luarn, H. Lin, Toward an understanding of the behavioral intention to
use mobile banking, Computers in Human Behavior 21 (6) (2005) 873–891.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2004.03.003.
[9] M. Sharples, The design of personal mobile technologies for lifelong learning,
Computers and Education 34 (2000) 177–193.
[10] A.N. Joinson, U.D. Reips, T. Buchanan, C.B.P. Schofield, Privacy, trust, and self-
disclosure online, Human–Computer Interaction 25 (1) (2010) 1–24.
[11] H. Hochheiser, J. Feng, J. Lazar, Challenges in Universally Usable Privacy and
Security, in: Paper Presented at the SOUPS’08, Pittsburg, 2009.
[12] M. Hassenzahl, A. Platz, M. Burmester, K. Lehner, Hedonic and Ergonomic
Quality Aspects Determine a Software’s Appeal, in: Paper Presented at the
CHI2000, The Hague, Amsterdam, 2000.
[13] J. Khaslavsky, N. Shedroff, Understanding the seductive experience, Commu-
nications of the ACM 42 (5) (1999) 45–49.
[14] S. Dutta, I. Mia, Global Information Technology Report 2010— 011, Geneva:
World Economic Forum, 2011, pp. 435.
[15] B. Harvey, Computer Science Logo Style, MIT Press, 1997.
[16] J. Piaget, The Construction of Reality in the Child, Basic books, New York, NY,
1954.
[17] S. Papert, Mindstorms, Children, Computers and Powerful Ideas, Basic Books,
Great Britain, 1980.
[18] S. Papert, The conservation of Piaget: The computer as a grist to the
constructivist mill, in: G. Forman, P. Pufall (Eds.), Constructivism in the
Computer Age, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, NJ, 1988, pp. 3–13.
[19] M. Resnick, Multilogo: a study of children and concurrent programming,
Interactive Learning Environments 1 (3) (1991) 158–170.
[20] M Resnick, J. Maloney, A. Monroy Hernández, N. Rusk, E. Eastmond, K. Brennan,
Y.B. Kafai, Scratch programming for all, Communications of the ACM 82 (11)
(2009).
[21] Y.B. Kafai, Minds in Play: Computer Game design as a context for children’s
learning. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence- Erlbaum, 1995.
[22] E. Soloway, M. Guzdial, K.E. Hay, Learner-centered design: the challenge for
HCI in the 21st century, Interactions 1 (2) (1994) 26–48.
[23] Y.B. Kafai, Video-game design by girls and boys: variability and consistency
of gender differences, in: J. Cassell, H. Jenkins (Eds.), From Barbie to Mortal
Kombat: Gender and Computer Games, MIT Press, 1998, pp. 90–118.
[24] J. Cassell, H. Jenkins (Eds.), From Barbie to Mortal Kombat, Gender and
Computer Games, MIT Press, 1998.
[25] J. Cassell, S. Prevost, J. Sullivan, E. Churchill, Embodied Conversational Agents,
MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 2000.
[26] J. Glos, J. Cassell, Rosebud Technological Toys for Storytelling, in: Paper
Presented at the CHI’97, Atlanta, GA, 1997.
[27] K. Ryokai, J. Cassell, Storymat: a playspace for collaborative storytelling,
in: Paper Presented at the CHI’99, Pittsburgh, PA, 1999.
[28] A. Druin, J. Montemayor, J. Hendler, B. McAlister, A. Boltman, E. Fiterman,
A. Plaisant, Designing PETS: A Personal Electronic Teller of Stories, in: Paper
Presented at the CHI99, 1999.
[29] Y.L. Theng, N. Mohd-Nasir, H. Thimbleby, G. Buchanan, M. Jones, Designing
a Digital Library with and for Children, in: Paper Presented at the Digital
Libraries, San Antonio, TX, 2000.
[30] M. Bers, J. Cassell, Interactive storytelling systems for children: using
technology to explore language and identity, Journal of Interactive Learning
Research 9 (1998) 183–215.
[31] S. Airey, L. Plowman, D. Connolly, R. Luckin, Rating Children’s Enjoyment of
Toys, Games and Media, in: Paper Presented at the 3rd World Congress of
International Toy Research on Toys, Games and Media, London, 2002.
[32] H. Stromberg, A. Vaatanen, V.-P. Raty, A group game played in interactive
virtual space, in: Paper Presented at the DIS2002, London, UK, 2002.
[33] Y. Kafai, C.C. Ching, S. Marshall, Children as designers of educational
multimedia software, Computers Education 29 (2/3) (1997) 117–126.
[34] T. Jones, An empirical study of children’s use of computer pointing devices,
Journal of Educational Computing Research 7 (1) (1991) 61–76.
[35] G. Revelle, E. Strommen, The effects of practice and input device used on young
children’s computer control, Journal of Computing in Childhood 2 (1) (1990)
33–41.
[36] K. Inkpen, Drag-and-drop versus point-and-click mouse interaction styles for
children, ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction 8 (1) (2001)
1–33.
[37] C.B. Mills, L.J. Weldon, Reading text from computer screens, ACM Computing
Surveys 19 (4) (1987) 329–358.
[38] J. Mostow, A.G. Hauptmann, S.F. Roth, Demonstration of a Reading Coach that
Listens, in: Paper Presented at the UIST’95, Pittsburgh, PA, 1995.
[39] W. Barendregt, M.M. Bekker, Children may expect drag-and-drop instead of
point-and-click, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 2011 Annual
Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems,
Vancouver, BC, Canada, 2011.
[40] J.P. Hourcade, K.B. Perry, A. Sharma, PointAssist: Helping Four Year Olds Point
with Ease, in: Paper Presented at the IDC 2008, 2008.
[41] O. Zuckerman, S. Arida, M. Resnick, Extending tangible interfaces for
education: digital montessori inspired manipulatives, in: Paper Presented at
the CHI’05, New York, NY, 2005.
[42] B. Brederode, P. Markopoulos, M. Gielen, A. Vermeeren, H. de Ridder,
pOwerball: The design of a novel mixed-reality game for children with mixed
abilities, in: Paper Presented at the IDC 2005, Boulder, Colorado, 2005.
[43] J. Verhaegh, W. Fontijn, J. Hoonhout, TagTiles: Optimal challenge in
educational electronics, in: Paper Presented at the TEI’07, New York, NY, 2007.
[44] J. Marco, E. Cerezo, S. Baldasarri, E. Mazzone, J.C. Read, Bringing tabletop
technologies to kindergarten children, in: Paper Presented at the BCS-
HCI2009, Cambridge, UK, 2009.
[45] E.I. Mansor, My world(s)’: a tabletop environment to support fantasy play
for kindergarten children, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the
6th International Conference on Interaction Design and Children, Aalborg,
Denmark, 2007.

5. J.C. Read, P. Markopoulos / International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction ( ) – 5
[46] J. Rick, A. Harris, P. Marshall, R. Fleck, N. Yuill, Y. Rogers, Children designing
together on a multi-touch tabletop: an analysis of spatial orientation and
user interactions, in: Paper Presented at the 8th International Conference on
Interaction Design and Children, IDC’09, 2009.
[47] E. Hanna, K. Risden, M. Czerwinski, K.J. Alexander, The role of usability research
in designing children’s computer products, in: A. Druin (Ed.), The Design of
Children’s Technology, Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco, 1999, pp. 4–26.
[48] A. Donker, P. Markopoulos, A comparison of think-aloud, questionnaires and
interviews for testing usability with children, in: Paper Presented at the
BHCI2002, London, 2002.
[49] J.C. Read, Validating the Fun Toolkit: an instrument for measuring children’s
opinions of technology. Cognition Technology and Work, 2007.
[50] B. Zaman, V.V. Abeele, Laddering with young children in User eXperience
evaluations: theoretical groundings and a practical case, in: Paper Presented
at the IDC’10, 2010.
[51] P. Markopoulos, J.C. Read, S.J. MacFarlane, J. Hoysniemi, Evaluating Interactive
Products for and with Children, Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco, 2008.
[52] C. Dindler, E. Eriksson, O.S. Iverson, A. Lykke-Olesen, M. Ludvigen, Mission from
Mars - A Method for Exploring User Requirements for Children in a Narrative
Space, in: Paper Presented at the IDC, Boulder, CO, 2005.
[53] M. Scaife, Y. Rogers, F. Aldrich, M. Davies, Designing For or Designing With?
Informant Design for Interactive Learning Environments, in: Paper Presented
at the CHI ’97, Atlanta, 1997.
[54] J. Robertson, Experiences of designing with children and teachers in the
StoryStation Project, in: Paper Presented at the IDC 2002, Eindhoven, 2002.
[55] M. Stringer, E. Harris, G. Fitzpatrick, Exploring the Space of Near-Future Design
with Children, in: Paper Presented at the Nordichi 2006, Oslo, 2006.
[56] E. Mazzone, J.C. Read, R. Beale, Understanding children’s contributions during
informant design. Paper Presented at the BCS-HCI’08, 2008.
[57] M.L. Guha, A. Druin, G. Chipman, F.J. A, S. Simms, A. Farber, Mixing Ideas:
A New Technique for Working with Young Children as Design Partners, in:
Paper Presented at the IDC 2004, College Park. Maryland, 2004.
[58] A. Druin, Cooperative inquiry: developing new technologies for children with
children, in: Paper Presented at the CHI99, 1999.
[59] J.P. Hourcade, T.R. Berkel, Simple pen interaction performance of young and
older adults using handheld computers, Interacting with Computers 20 (1)
(2008) 166–183. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.intcom.2007.10.002.
[60] R.J.W. Sluis-Thiescheffer, M.M. Bekker, J.H. Eggen, A.P.O.S. Vermeeren, H. de
Ridder, Development and application of a framework for comparing early
design methods for young children, Interacting with Computers 23 (1) (2011)
70–84. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.intcom.2010.10.002.
[61] A.N. Antle, A. Bevans, J. Tanenbaum, K. Seaborn, S. Wang, Futura: design for
collaborative learning and game play on a multi-touch digital tabletop, in:
Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on
Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction, Funchal, Portugal, 2011.
[62] S. Price, T. Pontual Falcã, Where the attention is: discovery learning in novel
tangible environments, Interacting with Computers 23 (5) (2011) 499–512.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.intcom.2011.06.003.
[63] A.N. Antle, A.F. Wise, K. Nielsen, Towards Utopia: designing tangibles for
learning, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 10th International
Conference on Interaction Design and Children, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 2011.
[64] S. Gilutz, S. Calvert, K. Kremer, B. Chamberlin, G. Gay, Tangible interfaces for
children: cognitive, social, and #38; physical benefits and challenges, in: Paper
Presented at the Proceedings of the 2012 ACM Annual Conference Extended
Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems Extended Abstracts,
Austin, Texas, USA, 2012.
[65] N. Freed, J. Qi, C. Sylla, P. Branco, Beyond the binding: exploring the future
book, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 8th ACM Conference on
Creativity and Cognition, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, 2011.
[66] L. Colombo, M. Landoni, E. Rubegni, Understanding reading experience
to inform the design of ebooks for children, in: Paper Presented at the
Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Interaction Design and
Children, Bremen, Germany, 2012.
[67] M. Sharples, I. Arnedillo-Sánchez, M. Milrad, G. Vavoula, in: N. Balacheff,
S. Ludvigsen, T. Jong, A. Lazonder, S. Barnes (Eds.), Mobile Learning
Technology-Enhanced Learning, : Springer Netherlands, 2009, pp. 233–249.
[68] C. Cahill, A. Kuhn, S. Schmoll, W.-T. Lo, B. McNally, C. Quintana, Mobile learning
in museums: how mobile supports for learning influence student behavior, in:
Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on
Interaction Design and Children, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 2011.
[69] A. Druin, Mobile Technology for Children, Morgan Kauffmann, New York, 2009.
[70] A. Kumar, A. Tewari, G. Shroff, D. Chittamuru, M. Kam, J. Canny, An exploratory
study of unsupervised mobile learning in rural India, in: Paper Presented at
the Proceedings of the 28th International Conference on Human Factors in
Computing Systems, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, 2010.
[71] H. Raffle, Topobo: programming by example to create complex behaviors.
Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 9th International Conference of the
Learning Sciences - Volume 2, Chicago, Illinois, 2010.
[72] R. Sheehan, D. Cho, J. Ha Park, Improving on a physics-based programming
system for children. in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 11th
International Conference on Interaction Design and Children, Bremen,
Germany, 2012.
[73] J. Meyers, J. LaMarche, M. Eisenberg, Craftopolis: blending tangible, informal
construction into virtual multiuser communities, in: Paper Presented at the
Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Interaction Design and
Children, Barcelona, Spain, 2010.
[74] S. Yarosh, Y.C. Chew, G.D. Abowd, Supporting parent–child communication in
divorced families, International Journal of Human Computer Studies 67 (2)
(2009) 192–203.
[75] H. Raffle, R. Ballagas, G. Revelle, H. Horii, S. Follmer, E. Go, E. Reardon, K. Mori,
J. Kaye, M. Spasojevic, Family story play: reading with young children (and
Elmo) over a distance, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 28th
International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Atlanta,
Georgia, USA, 2010.
[76] J.C. Read, R. Beale, Under my pillow: designing security for children’s special
things, in: Paper Presented at the DCS - HCI 2009, Cambridge, UK, 2009.
[77] F. Garzotto, M. Bordogna, Paper-based multimedia interaction as learning
tool for disabled children, in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 9th
International Conference on Interaction Design and Children, Barcelona, Spain,
2010.
[78] E. Ackermann, F. Decortis, J.P. Hourcade, H. Schelhowe, Cultural coding and de-
coding as ways of participation: digital media for marginalized young people,
in: Paper Presented at the Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on
Interaction Design and Children, Como, Italy, 2009.
[79] M.L. Guha, A. Druin, J.A. Fails, Designing < i > with < /i > and < i > for <
/i > children with special needs: an inclusionary model, in: Paper Presented
at the Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Interaction Design
and Children, Chicago, Illinois, 2008.
[80] B. Zaman, V. Vanden-Abeele, P. Markopoulos, P. Marshall, The evolving field
of tangible interaction for children: the challenge of empirical validation,
Personal and Ubiquitous Computing 16 (4) (2012) 367–378.
[81] J.J. Jensen, M.B. Skov, A review of research methods in Children’s technology
design, in: Paper Presented at the IDC 2005, Boulder, Colorado, 2005.
[82] S. Yarosh, I. Radu, S. Hunter, E. Rosenbaum, Examining Values: An Analysis of
Nine Years of IDC Research in: Paper Presented at the IDC 2011, Ann Arbor, MI,
2011.