Amazon wants to get kids reading through an app that looks like texting
Amazon has a new plan to get kids reading.
The tech giant on Wednesday launched Amazon Rapids, a reading app aimed at 7-to-12-year-olds. The paid app contains hundreds of stories, all told in dialogue animated to look like text messages.
The interactive app allows readers to swipe back and forth through dialogue, prompting each new message to appear on the screen. Until the reader prompts the next message to appear, the character who speaks next will even look like they're typing, with the three dots familiar to anyone with iMessage.
"The stories are through the lens of characters chatting with each other, one message at a time," Michael Robinson, director of consumer products for Amazon Education, told Mashable.
The stories are designed to be a type of game, encouraging kids to continue reading. The stories average between 500 and 1,000 words and take between five and 10 minutes to read, depending on reading level. That length is designed for mobile.
The app, available on iOS, Android and Amazon Fire, has "hundreds" of stories and will add "dozens" each month, Robinson said.
The app allows readers to look up words they don't know and save them to a glossary. It includes a "read to me" feature for the app to read the dialogue out loud.
The stories are written by children's authors, many of whom have written Amazon-exclusive children's books in the past. Professional illustrators, many of whom have also worked with Amazon before, draw the stories' accompanying illustrations.
Kids using the app create their own profiles that recommend stories based on interests, age, reading level and other factors.
Families will pay $2.99 a month for the service, with no difference in pricing for Prime members.
The app is mainly designed for parents — with one account working across six devices, for multiple children to use at once — but it could also work in schools, Robinson said.
The app represents another offering by Amazon related to its original core business: reading. The company in October added more book benefits for Prime members, and Amazon is still planning its push into physical, retail bookstores.
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Topics Amazon Apps & Software Books
Emma Hinchliffe is a business reporter at Mashable. Before joining Mashable, she covered business and metro news at the Houston Chronicle.
