A great article in the NYTimes talks about a boom in e-books sales for kids and teens, possibly spurred by holiday e-reader gifts.
Ink Spells has been a long time* advocate for and predictor of e-readers as the wave of the kidlit fiture.
*approximately a year, which is 7 years in internet-time
This is what I had to say in November 2009:
I think teens and adults will lead the charge, but will children’s books be far behind? Picture books will always be around, with their glossy pages and gorgeous illustrations, but how long will it be before the kids want their own nook? They’ll curl up at night with their small screens, their own library of e-books just a finger-touch away.
I’m thinking a year or two, 2014 at the outside.
I should have stuck with my first estimate of a year, because a mere 15 months later, e-books are 25% of all sales of teen books in January, picture books are showing up on iPads, and “tweens and teenagers (are) clustered in groups and reading their Nooks or Kindles together.”
Rather than resting on my prediction laurels, I wonder how this will change the way children read. I’m not talking about screen-time (e-ink is no harder on the eyes than paper) or attention span (Angry Birds anyone?). One problem that a blogger friend is already facing is that children have access to books of any kind and number with the touch of a button. In order to protect your pocketbook, and the innocence of your son or daughter’s childhood, you might want to keep an eye on the books that they download. But this easy access may break down a barrier that parents and publishers alike take for granted: the fact that children usually have gatekeepers to select their reading material.
I wonder if removing the gatekeepers, giving children essentially the world’s library at their fingertips, will lead to more reading.
I think the answer has to be yes. Variety, after all, is the spice of life.
Although I let my boys roam the library and bookstore, looking for books in the children’s section, those books have been pre-selected by librarians and bookstore owners. When children have access to the internet, to book blogs and Nooks, will they do more of their own decision-making? Will they seek out and try new things, or will they still rely on the adult gatekeepers to guide their reading?
I’ll venture to predict that children will begin to drive their own sales, as they have the ability to search and find exactly what tickles their fancy. Given that the main reason kids stop reading is because they can’t find anything they enjoy, we may see a sweeping increase in young readers. Publishers will start to market directly to kids, via an e-reader that has straight access to their eyeballs, just as sugared cereal manufacturers know to advertise during Dora the Explorer.
Is this good, or part of the e-pocalypse? I’m not sure, but I’m willing to bet an ice cream that it will happen whether we like it or not.
And this time, I’m sticking with my first instinct: it will happen within a year (ok, maybe two).
I'm sure it's coming and it's not a bad thing. But I don't agree with giving kids free access to the internet. And I'm sure that it will get abused. And it bothered me to watch kids listen to their ereader instead of actually reading. I'm sure I'll be the last to buy my kids an ereader, even though I have one.
@Laura I let my kids borrow mine, but I agree about not letting them have free access to the internet (it tweaked my brain to realize this was essentially what the readers will do). Yet, there are many parents who will (or already are) fine with this, so I can't help but wonder how that will change things. Maybe they'll develop a "kid-friendly" version of the software, that restricts access to children's books, or some such thing? Hm…
I agree. Kids are gonna love having their own gadgets. I foresee all kids using tablets for school work in the next 20 years. I'm excited about teens getting into eReaders because it opens the door to self-pubbing. Since writing for teens is what I do, if I can't find an agent, I can still get stuff out there to be read if I want to. That is very exciting.
But I do have concerns with kids getting access to questionable content. They'll have to figure out a way to implement parental controls on the eReaders.
I ran across something in the library for kids, that's a combination ereader/audio book. Very cool. And yes it is all happening so amazingly fast it makes my head spin.
@PK I think you're right about those school tablets, too!
@KarenG It is truly tough to keep up! 🙂
And what happens if your eight-year-old buys $7200 worth of books? That's a lot of allowances.
@Bryan Exactly! Perhaps B&N can come up with a "kids account" that can be charged up, like a gift card, with a specified amount of money to be spent. Right now, they require a credit card. This is precisely the problem my friend ran into (ditto many friends with kids who like to text – ouch!).
I think the idea of a kid's account would be great. A little like the Visa Bux starter credit cards for teens, in that they could offer kids a chance to manage their own budget, but could also allow parents to keep some sort of rein on the spending. Kids might not mind that much either, as it might be easier to get dad and mom to spring for money for books than for video games, etc.
@Ben I love that idea! We can already spring for gift cards for books, but we need something that's like a limited credit account – like the Visa Bux. It's even a great way to learn about managing money! I likes.
Hmmm, interesting post. I am a bit of a tech dork so I love all reading gadgets and suspect my kids will too (they've already commandeered my iPad LOL) but it's the content issue that worries me. Though, let's face it, the parents who would act as a regular "gatekeeper" for their children when it comes to physical books will surely also check up periodically on what they are downloading too – right?
@Lindsay Yes! As always, everything is really in control of the parents. While there are some parents who will not exercise this control, the ones who want to certainly can. But I'm a lot happier parent when I have some tech tools on my side to help with the monitoring.
I wonder how many adults are buying these teen books… 😀
but I know you're onto something. Just yesterday my 7 yr-old asked if she could have her own Kindle for reading her Junie B. Jones books. Me: umm… maybe next year. 😀
@LTM No question adults are buying some of the teen books. Heck, I alone probably accounted for a decent fraction of them! 🙂
Did you notice that the Xoom tablet got its own commercial during the SuperBowl? Tablets will make e-readers HUGE! My kids would go gaga over it. Personally though I want to see stats on how TOUGH these things are before I let my kids start carrying it around 🙂
@Margo I didn't see that! But I can totally seeing the kids loving tablets ..
My 6th grader has a classmate who reads all of his books on his Kindle, at home and in class. My kids aren't enamoured with the Kindle, but they do like the iPad. Graphic novels and pbs are awesome to read on there, and I like reading my novels on there, too, since it feels more like a real page. I read that same article and planned a similar post for Wednesday, though I'm not making any predictions 🙂
@Sherrie Even if you're not making predictions, I look forward to reading your post! 🙂 It's fascinating to me that kids are taking these to school. A NookKids version would be very cool.
I hated the idea of e-books the first time I heard it. Now I can't wait to get my own reader and digital library. All those books at my fingertip. Yup, I'm a convert.
Great food for thought. Our middle school is buying B&N Nooks & MP3 players for free reading time in the classroom because running out of book shelf space.
Blogs are a great way to prove you really did make a prediction! In June 2009 (http://wcslibrary.edublogs.org/2009/06/16/the-hunger-games-by-suzanne-collins/)I predicted that "Hunger Games" might enter the English curriculum, and at a recent school librarians meeting, that was confirmed. One middle school ordered 120 copies.
@Leisha Yay, for an e-book convert! 🙂
@Carol That is so cool, that your school is already buying e-readers. You are definitely ahead of the curve! And Hunger Games rocks! As it turns out, I just finished re-reading it, studying plot structure and craft. Collins is masterful. 🙂
This strikes close to home for me. My 11 year old used all of his money in the world to buy a Nook last year and he LOVES reading on it. He also loved reading actual books, but once he started on the Nook, he didn't want to go back. I immediately realized the content and credit card issues were worrisome. So far he hasn't bought anything expensive. I've raised both of my kids as big bargain shoppers, plus my son has several gift cards loaded up on his Nook account which get dinged before it starts using the credit card. I think the fact that he knows what he buys will be coming out of HIS money first makes it less tempting to go nuts. Also, the Nook account isn't really any different than an itunes account. You have to have a credit card attached to that and trust your child too. As far as content goes, that's tricky. I don't see why BN or Amazon couldn't make some sort of parental controls available if they decide they want to. We had a situation recently when Neal found a YA series and bought and started reading it. I wanted to find reviews about the content before he got too far in, but couldn't. It was a series by a young author from a small publisher (or maybe self-published, not sure). So that's another thing about the Nook/ereaders. You can find inexpensive books that aren't known or reviewed yet. Cool in theory, but scary as a parent. Neal loved the series and read all three books in a week, but it did end up having some adult language and sexual scenes. He says they weren't too bad. I assume that means not too detailed. I'm going to have him "Lend Me" the series for my Nook and find out for sure. These are definitely things to think about with ereaders! (Oh, and another thing not mentioned: For each Nook account in a household, you need to set up another B&N account online. If you don't, you will have full access to each other's libraries. Not that big of a deal to do, but I wouldn't have set Neal's Nook up with my account when he got his if I had realized I would have to create a new one for myself if I ever got my own Nook).
@Rhonda Thanks for sharing your experience! You bring up some great points, especially about iTunes (hadn't thought of it that way, but it is the same). A lot of this tech is still evolving and I think many of these things will change as people use them and find uses for them. Thanks for stopping by! 🙂
I will try not to say anything more after this, but I remembered my daughter told me that in her church group, when the pastor asks to see who brought their bibles, most of the middle schoolers hold up their iTouch, opened to their downloaded bible, these days. So there's another area changing. And, on the topic of the Xoom Superbowl commercial: Why did they have to have that? My son now wants a tablet too (guess that answers my question).
@Rhonda Wow! The thing with the bibles is amazing.
The kids in my 5th grade class are very tech-savvy. Many of them did get e-readers for the holidays, but they still love putting their feet up on their desks and reading a book.