PicPocketBooks

About PicPocket Books:

PicPocket Books, established in the spring of 2009, is founded by husband-wife team Lynette and Manuel Mattke who share a passion for children’s literature and technological innovation.

Selected PicPocket Book titles like Monster Trucks, Tractors, Rescue Vehicles, and Round Is A Mooncake have some interactive audio hot spots. We are adding animations to some titles that are currently in production. The animations are subtle, like snow falling or stars twinkling, because we publish previously published books rather than made-for-iPhone stories – so the artwork is already drawn, and we strive to remain faithful to the original book. Our intent is to encourage curiosity by adding elements of interactive discovery to each title which the hot spots and subtle animations provide. We are consciously NOT creating video games, but hope that PicPocket Books can offer a gentle alternative to games for parents who want to offer their children mobile digital books.

PicPocket Books are individual iPhone/iTouch apps that you download.  Each one is meant to be like reading a book, and not intended as a video game.  They also add subtle animation to some titles, and certain books have interactive features too, such as clicking on a cat to hear meowing, for instance.   You simply start the app, and the story will start.  There are options (on/off) to play the audio track of someone reading the book, highlighting words as they are read aloud, and auto-turning pages for you.  By default they are all on.  Some stories are longer than others, some are horiztonal vs vertical, and there are stories tailored to children of different ages.

We were sent Round is a Mooncake, Big Rigs, and Then It Rained to review.    Round is a Mooncake is a great story for the upcoming Chinese Moon Festival, and talks about many of the different things you’ll see, such as Dim Sum, Mooncakes, and Red Envelopes.  It also teaches kids to find shapes in all different places.  I like that it has an added interactive feature where you can click on certain animals to hear different sounds.  I also like that at the end of the book, they go back over the new words and define each one.  Big Rigs is a fun book for kids who love big trucks – there are brightly colored pictures of all kinds of trucks.  Then It Rained is a story about a little boy who was forced to abandon many of his plans due to the weather.  Eventually, he is able to remind his parents of the fun that can be had in any situation.  Brandon’s favorite was Round is a Mooncake!

I love that each PicPocket book really looks like the actual book – they really make a point to retain the look and feel of the original book.  It’s also nice that you can just turn it on and let it run.  Kids can just sit back, relax, and enjoy a nice little story read to them.  They can watch the words get highlighted as they go to help new readers follow along, and the audio tracks are all engaging and fun.  I felt like I was in the library at story time!  :)  The only tip I have is to go to your Settings > General and change the auto-lock on your phone to 5 minutes or never so that your phone doesn’t turn off in the middle of the story.

Buy One!

PicPocket Books offers iPhone and iTouch compatible applications for download at the iTunes App Store, priced from $0.99 – $3.99 per book.  You can also purchase hard copies of the books I reviewed on amazon.com to go along with your app – Round is a Mooncake, Big Rigs, Then It Rained.

Win One!

PicPocket Books would like to offer FIVE lucky babybix blog readers their very own PicPocket Book of choice!

To enter this contest, simply fill out the form below so I know how to contact you.  You must do this before you can do the extra entries below.

** Contest closed – Congrats Jen, Ale, Debbie, Jon, and Julia! **

For extra entries:

• Visit PicPocket Books and tell me which book you would choose if you won – choose wisely, as this is what you’ll get if you win!
• Tell me what other book would you like to see available on PicPocket Books.
• Does your child play with your iPhone?  If so, tell me what apps does he/she likes best.
• Follow @PicPocketBooks on Twitter
• Follow babybix – follow me on networked blogs, Friend Connect, become a Facebook Fan, follow @babybixcom on Twitter, or subscribe to my RSS feed. One extra entry for each one.
• Spread the word – RT this giveaway and leave me your Twitter ID (can be done daily), write an entry in your blog and link to this giveaway, or place my link in your blogroll.  One extra entry each.
• Go to babybix.com, sign up for an account (free) to track your child, and tell us what your favorite feature is.  If you already have an account, just let me know what your favorite feature is.
• If you haven’t taken my survey yet, you can get an extra 5 entries to any giveaway!
• Add my new logo to your site:



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If you do any of the above, please leave a comment saying which one you did.  Feel free to leave multiple comments if you do multiple extra entries.

This contest is open to US and Canadian residents.  I will select a random winner on 2/15, and the winner will have 48 hours to reply to my email or I will select a new winner.  Good luck!