I love books. I also love lovers of books. And I particularly love book lovers who aren’t too “precious” to also enjoy a little modern technology for their books, (all hail Kindles and iPads). Such is the case with this small new company with a mission to bring some of the wonderful children’s books of the 19th and early 20th centuries to a new generation of readers through tablet technology.

The company kandelsmith,
otherwise known as Rita Smith and her daughter Rachel, has just
launched with two new apps, the beautifully designed if plainly named ABCs Volume 1 and 2.

Volume
1 consists of two alphabet books from historical children’s literature,
Baseball ABCs (1885) and Elton’s Pictorial (1848). Volume 2 has Funny
Zoological ABCs (1873) and Child’s Treasury of Knowledge (1860). The
volumes are beautifully retouched, quite vibrant on the iPad interface,
and stir up all your parental nostalgia (not that any of us were
actually around in the 19th century, but still).

Also be aware that Volume 2 uses words like queer (meaning “odd”) for Q, or referring to donkeys as asses. Personally, I think that’s a good learning opp to talk to older kids about how language has changed, the way you do when you read classic books to them from earlier generations.

To call the apps “interactive” however is a bit of a stretch–the only
real interaction is choosing the “Read to Me” option as opposed to
reading it yourself, or the “Press and Hear Objects” where you press an
object to hear its name.

But
if you have very young children who will be charmed by the lovely
pictures and quirky rhymes, and will press a picture of a ball a hundred
times just to hear someone say ball, then the kandelsmith apps are a worthy investment. – Shari

Purchase kandelsmith’s ABCs Volume 1 and Volume 2 on iTunes fr $1.99 each.