We had the opportunity to talk with the team from Intro To Letters
1. What was your main objective or motivation for creating the Intro to Letters mobile app?
Our goal was to create a well-crafted, personalized, self-guided learning experience for children. We believe that children are born with a natural sense of curiosity and the Intro to Letters app allows them to discover and foster their desire to learn. The primary motivation of the app was to make self-directed learning fun, intuitive, and personalized for children ages 3-5. Intro to Letters provides a platform for kids to learn how to trace, read, write and record letter sounds, names and phonograms, based on the Montessori approach to education.
2. If you could describe the Intro to Letters app in ONE word, what would it be and why?
Intuitive- we wanted to make the app features and navigation so simple that a child could use it. The interactions had to be immersive, robust, and promote positive reinforcement in order to become an effective learning tool for kids.
3. What is the coolest or most innovative feature of Intro to Letters?
“Recording Studio”- this feature lets children personalize their learning experience by listening to voiceover prompts of their loved ones.
This feature has been translated in over 40 languages and is a great tool to empower kids in the learning process.
4. Could you share a challenging factor of the development or marketing process?
Deciding the right price point. Intro to Letters commands a premium in the app children category space and we were apprehensive on how this would be received by everyone. We are very glad that our app has been extremely popular and is among the higher rated apps on iTunes.
5. Any unexpected surprises post-release of the Intro to Letters app?
An unexpected surprise was the media visibility Intro to Letters received post release. It was featured by Apple under “Best New Apps,” on Apple Billboards worldwide and also received big banner feature in the Education section of the app store.
6. Do you plan on releasing an Android or Windows Phone app as well?
Not at the moment
7. What is your favorite mobile app to date and which have inspired you?
Intro to Geography is an app that we love and challenges us on multiple levels. It’s an app designed for children, yet which many adults can learn from and appreciate. There is something satisfying when we see an adult relearn their geography by using the Montessori method.
8. What features do you hope to roll out to the Intro to Letters app in the future?
We are focused on building features that tightly integrate Intro to Letters with our other literacy apps. Also, we would like to some day introduce alternate character systems (Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, etc).