Salient Features of iStoryTree

‘If you want your child to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.’ ~ Albert Eisntein

‘If you want your child to be more intelligent, along with being creative and imaginative, buy iStoryTree.’ ~ TechTree IT Systems Pvt. Ltd.

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Ideas gain importance and become great only when they are manifested into the real world. Without the process of implementation, they would remain mere fluff.

Some great ideas, however, do get implemented at any cost. And iStoryTree is a live example.

With loads of surprises and fun activities that teach and entertain your child at the same time, iStoryTree is filled with artistic illustrations of the highest quality. Introducing for the first time a perfect educational and activity picture book app that develops your child’s Motor Skills, Cognitive Skills and language skills in a very simple way!

Designed to keep your little angel’s curiosity ignited, starting with the story Crab and Crane, iStoryTree makes sure your child laughs, while he/she learns.

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Salient features of iStoryTree:

1.      Delightful animations and marvelous sound effects:

The picturesque background, against which the story is set, has a language of its own: Authenticity.

Mind-blowing animations will immerse your child into the stories. With their unique physicality and sounds, characters look believable. Every twitch on the character’s face is visible; and every non-living thing veritable.

Every character’s sound is unique; and artists at TechTree IT have made it possible for you to notice that uniqueness. The chirping of birds, the plop that comes when fish dive into the water…

The visuals, when accompanied by proper sound and music, create more impact than any known medium. We, at TechTree IT, understand this well. And iStoryTree is the proof.

2.      Eloquent Narration:

In any story, narration plays an important role. How well someone tells a story makes all the difference. iStoryTree’s ‘Read to Me’ feature does just that: it tells the story in the most exquisite way possible. A pleasing voice, coupled with delightful animations, immerses your child in the story like never before. Each word is carefully enunciated, as the word is highlighted, so that your child can focus and understand easily.

You want to attend the door and stop the narration for a while? Well, you have an option to stop the narrative midway, and continue later on, at your convenience. Or play the page again from the beginning. And once a page is complete, just ask your child to tap on the characters, the background and the objects, and enjoy the expressions on your darling’s face: everything that is tapped will come to life with funny sounds and animations. The chirpy birds take flight, the fish fly and dive back in, the frog jumps, the clouds float, the grass sways, and the main characters of the story even tell their names.

Needless to say, your child learns to pronounce words properly. Reading skills are automatically improved. And as you must already know, the first thing to know about reading is how to read with commas and periods. Finally, it goes without saying that with marvelous visuals and sound effects, and a pleasing voice, your child’s listening skills are improved beyond means.

Reading and listening skills are two of the most important cognitive skills.

3.      Read by yourself:

Want to read by yourself? iStoryTree’s ‘I wanna Read’ feature lets you read by yourself, spelling out each word at a slow and a steady pace.

Tap on a word to know how to pronounce it properly; also learn to spell it. And if you want to know the meaning of a difficult word, just press and hold the word for one second and see the meaning popping out, with the word’s part-of-speech. Along with the meaning, the inbuilt dictionary also gives an example on how to use the word effectively in a sentence.

Want to go away for a few minutes, maybe to prepare hot chocolate for your child? Just hand over your iPad to your little angel before you go. It might amaze you to know that your child develops motor skills along with pronunciation skills when he starts using his fingers to tap the screen.

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Before we go any further, let’s understand what motor skills are:

Motor skills are functions, which involve precise movements of muscles with the intent to perform a specific act. Or, they are motions carried out when the brain, nervous system and muscles work together.

There are two kinds of motor skills: Fine motor skills and Gross motor skills.

Fine motor skills are small movements such as grabbing something with your thumb and forefinger.

Gross motor skills are bigger movements like jumping and running.

It is extremely important for a child to have these skills to perform well in academics, or in any other field. And iStoryTree helps a child acquire these skills easily.

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4.      It’s play time:

Now that storytelling is over, what next, you must be wondering. Well, it’s time for some fun. iStoryTree comes up with a unique feature that allows children to play as they learn.

Catch Them All teaches children how to count. Fish fly out of water, only to dive back in. You have to catch (tap) the fish when they are above water. Every time you tap a fish, your score is appended at the top. You have a minute to play the game.

This game not only teaches children how to count, but mainly it develops concentration. Their muscle memory increases when they use their little fingers to tap the fish with precision. In short, their fine motor skills develop.

Fill Me Up is a spelling test. When a word with a missing letter of the English alphabet appears on the screen, you have to guess the missing letter. Words keep coming up for a minute.

As children enjoy this game, they not only learn to spell the words, but also their cognitive skills develop. 

5.      Bring out the artist in your child:

Story time is over, games are over. So now what? How about some painting that brings out the artist in your child?! Sounds fun? It is.

iStoryTree’s Gallery has a unique feature: Finger-painting.

The gallery allows you to choose one of the eleven artworks. Upon choosing an artwork, select colors from the color palette, and various brushes provided at the right, and start painting! Not satisfied with your art? No problem. Perfection takes time. For the time being, choose an eraser and do away with the unsatisfactory part of your painting. Want to delete the whole thing? You can do that, too. And once you are done with your painting, you can save it on your iPad and share it on Facebook.

With this amazing feature you can also make greeting cards and send it to your friends and family. Once the painting is done, choose a predefined word from the given list (Happy B’day, Get Well Soon, All the Best, Happy Anniversary, etc), and paste it on your canvas. You can also stick stamps on your card (characters from the story).

That is not all. You can also select pictures from your iPad gallery, or click your own pictures using the camera, and paste them in the frame you have selected. Improve upon it, or distort it for fun.

It goes without saying that your child’s fine motor skills will be developed beyond means.

6.      Colors and Magic:

            

             One more activity that develops your child’s motor skills!

If activities like Catch Them All develop fine motor skills in children, Magic Colors develop gross motor skills. Children tend to become couch potatoes once in a while. It is then time to hand over your iPad to them, so that they can start dancing and coloring at the same time in a rhythmic fashion.

Choose your favorite outlined artwork from the story, hold the iPad in your hands and start moving and shaking. The magic colors magically start filling up the outlined artwork. And voila! Your child has become active again.

Once your artwork is complete, you can share the magic with your friends and relatives on Facebook.

7.      Narrate the story in your voice:

Is your child fed up of listening to prerecorded voice? Or are you traveling somewhere and want your child to feel your presence? Well, you are just a tap away.

iStoryTree comes with this beautiful feature where you can record the story in your voice and see the surprise in your child’s eyes. Scroll through the pages from the story, read the story in your voice, record it, and save it. The next time you want to show off your narrative skills, or if you want your child to listen to the story narrated by you, just select the saved file and play it.

There is also a sample voice of the voice artist for your reference.

If your child is old enough to read the story, ask him to record it in his voice. Further when you listen to the narrative, you can spot your child’s mistakes in pronunciation and improve upon it.

This exercise will develop your child’s reading skills in the best way possible: for there is a huge difference between telling your child of his mistakes, and making him realize his mistakes on his own.

8.      Dictionary:

Use the dictionary to learn the meanings of all the important words from the story. Along with the meaning, it also gives a sample sentence, teaching your child how to use the word effectively.

9.      Avatar Jennie:

Calling Jennie the star of iStoryTree wouldn’t be an overstatement: for 8-year-old Jennie tells the whole story with her unique expressions and hand-gestures, your child will learn elocution skills in a very easy way.

Language skills are acquired without any hassles: sequencing of sentences and words, comprehension, pronunciation, narrative skills, and ability to recall – everything automatically improves as your child listens to funny Jennie.

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Spanish philosopher and novelist George Santayana wasn’t wrong when he said, ‘A child educated only at school is an uneducated child.’

To fare well in this competitive world – learning values, developing language and developing the right attitude are as important as academic learning. iStoryTree does exactly that: it helps your child develop those life skills in a beautiful way. At the same time, it ensures your child giggles and laughs. After all, we believe in heaven; and heaven happens when a child giggles!

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When a Child Reviewed iStoryTree...

A few have reviewed the app and given us well-deserved thumbs ups, thousands have downloaded it on their iPads and enjoyed it; yet something was eating our hearts out. We were waiting for something more, something more exciting than formal reviews, something that would make us feel like heroes. What exactly we were waiting for, we could not tell.

Although our party had already begun, we were hoping our star guest would arrive soon. Again, who it was, we didn’t know. Hope was our only hope; waiting was our only choice of action.

We got our answers yesterday. We realized what exactly we were waiting for. A little child’s review of iStoryTree!

We don’t have to try too hard to make you understand the difference between a review given by a professional, and a layman. A professionals is a child, whereas a layman is, well, you know.

A young parent, Mr Saurabh (a software lead and architect by profession), recently downloaded iStoryTree, and shared his experience with us. Let’s hear it in his words:

‘The clock had struck nine; and having had rice and milk, and having brushed her teeth, it was our regular story time. As our little angel, Doog Doog, climbed into her little bed with Mickey Mouse sheets, two dolls (Rosy and Liza), and a stuffed teddy bear (Mando), I racked my brain for a possible story to tell her. Then it struck me. I had recently purchased your app, iStoryTree. I trotted off to my room and returned with my iPad.

I ran the app, as she lay on the bed, hugging Mando. ‘Wow! What is it?’ she asked.

‘It’s a story book, my dear,’ I said.

‘Which story are you going to read it today?’ she asked, widening her eyes.

Until now I had never let her handle my iPad, for fear she would treat it like one of her toys. After all she is just two, and iPad is $750. But today I was willing to let her handle it, for the reasons known only to my instincts.

‘No, it,’ pointing to my iPad, ‘will read you a story,’ I said.

Together we listened to the story of Crab and the Crane. It was marvelous to watch her expressions changing as the story moved forward. After reading each page, I asked her to tap the characters and other objects. She giggled and laughed and clapped in delight when the characters came alive on the screen, when the clouds moved, when the birds chirped and flew away, and when the fish dived into the water.

Once the story was over, it was time for some fun and games. “Catch Them All” immersed her into the iPad completely. She started catching fish with great alacrity. It was fascinating to see her fine motor skills at play. By now I had handed over the iPad to her completely. I sat beside her on the bed, with my arms around her tiny shoulders as she handled the game expertly.

What amused me more was not the way she played it, but each time the game got over, she tapped back and forth and restarted the game. And I hadn’t taught her to do it. Finally, when she was satisfied, she looked up to me and giggled.

‘Done with the game?’ I asked.

‘What else is there in this?’ she answered with a question.

‘Hmm. Let’s see,’ said I, exploring the options.

There was of course “gallery.” I was about to tap on it when Doog Doog did it herself. Finger-painting page came up to her surprise. I didn’t tell her what to do, for I wanted to see if she could figure it out by herself. And to my surprise, she did. By now she had understood one thing well: all you have to do is tap and slide your finger on the screen. She did just that. After drawing some pictures that could be deciphered only by her, I chose the next feature available on the app: Avatar.

As Jenny the Avatar started narrating the story, using her hands and eyes, Doog Doog sat in silence. Not a word, but plenty of smiles and giggles and widening of eyes. The feature runs for about six minutes, and Doog Doog listened to Jenny three times. She had begun the fourth time when her mom arrived and scolded her sweetly, for staying up till ten o’clock.

‘It’s time to sleep, sweetheart,’ said her mom.

‘Just one more time, mom,’ Doog Doog pleaded.

‘No, no. You can do it tomorrow again. Now go to sleep.’

It almost broke my heart to see my angel sad.

I delicately took the iPad from her hands and kissed her on the cheek. It was finally time for her to go into a fantastical world, where we, adults, are not allowed. Whatever happens there, only she knows. We can only imagine – which is not so easy.’

Mr Saurabh ended his narrative. The little child didn’t say how much she enjoyed iStoryTree, but she showed it. Well, after all, kids understand the difference between telling and showing, between being obvious and being subtle – something most adults don’t.

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