Cinekid Applab

APPLAB

Every day, thousands of new apps appear, in all shapes and sizes. Parents and educators want the best for their children, but how to identify the best apps within this vast, ever-expanding supply? Cinekid has developed an app to offer a helping hand. AppLab provides a selection of apps assessed and recommended by Cinekid – attractive, creative, safe, high-quality apps for young children. 

AppLab is an app that allows you to search in a targeted way for apps suitable for children of a particular age on the basis of a range of categories or themes. You can also watch films of the apps and read reviews written specially by

Cinekid. 

Cinekid strives for balanced child development. Every app included in AppLab is associated in its own way with a specific area in the development of growing children. Approximately eight categories in total have been drawn up, and the relationship of the apps to these categories is clearly indicated in the reviews. So you know exactly which aspects of the child’s development are stimulated by each app.

The content of AppLab is not fixed – new apps selected by Cinekid are added every month.

Context

AppLab is the outcome of research carried out for Cinekid in which app-builders, critics and researchers from all over the world were interviewed and professional literature on how children use apps was consulted. Theories from developmental psychology were examined to see how different apps and forms of play and interaction contribute to the various areas of child development. 

In all cases, this research was undertaken on the basis of both a theoretical framework – which allowed the apps to be assessed in a responsible, sound manner – and a division into categories offering practical information for everyday use. 

Both the app itself and this research is therefore a work in progress. New research questions are being formulated and the role apps can play in children’s development will be further explored in cooperation with a range of partners.

Cinekid

Cinekid is an annual film, television and new media festival for children from 3 to 14 years of age that takes place during the autumn break in Amsterdam and thirty other cities throughout the Netherlands. Alongside the public programming, there is an international professionals’ programme featuring a conference, seminars, expert meetings, a screening club and a cross-media market in Amsterdam. 

This year, the festival includes more than 220 film screenings, 90 television screenings and 1,400 m2 of MediaLab offering more than 50 different games, workshops and installations from all over the world. The festival provides an opportunity to experience beautiful stories, to watch exciting films from far-off countries and to get up-close-and-personal with Dutch TV heroes. The MediaLab gives you an opportunity to get involved actively with media. Everything is based around doing and making it yourself. You will discover exceptional interactive, enchanting new media and stunning innovations. Here, you will become media-savvy and discover new ways to tell stories.

All in all, Cinekid’s aim is to support high-quality media for children: we want to see as many good, attractive, moving films, television programmes and apps, games and installations being made for young people as possible. And we show it! At the festival, but also beyond – for example with this app.