Why paper, why together

Shared reading on paper

When an adult reads with a child, studies comparing print books with the same stories on screens have repeatedly found more story-related talk, better comprehension, and stronger word learning with the paper version. Interactive features on screens tend to pull attention toward the device and away from the conversation between the adult and the child.

This is why MirthTale prints. The device is where the book is made, not where it is read.

Repetition

Children who hear the same story several times learn its new words better than children who hear the same number of new stories. Familiarity is not a bug. A book that exists on paper is one that can be found again tomorrow, and the night after, and read in exactly the same way.

Conversational turns

The number of back-and-forth exchanges between an adult and a child predicts later language ability more strongly than the raw number of words a child hears. A story a child helped invent is a story with a lot to talk about: why the fox left, whether the biscuits were enough, what the sister would have done.

Handling a real book

Turning pages, holding a book the right way up, and following a story from front cover to back are part of how children learn what a story is. Printed picture pages and a bound spine are not nostalgia. They are the interface children learn to read on.

What this means for the design

• The display shows a cover and then goes dark. It never scrolls and never hides anything behind it.
• The child's ideas are kept exactly, so the book is worth talking about.
• Every book is bound to survive repeated reading.
• MirthTale writes only what the child leaves open, and never pressures a child to say more.

We are a small company, not a research institute. If you work in early literacy and want to read our source list or tell us we have something wrong, please write to us.