Scholastic Unveils BookFlix
By Debra Lau Whelan -- School Library Journal, 8/1/2007
The ebook market for kids just got a little more exciting. Scholastic recently launched BookFlix, an educational Web site that pairs popular picture books such as Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type (S & S, 2000) by Doreen Cronin and Betsy Lewin with a nonfiction ebook.
The interactive experience takes advantage of Scholastic’s Weston Woods audiovisual collection, allowing viewers to watch online videos of beloved picture books. Users then experience reading an accompanying nonfiction book by turning pages with a click of their mouse. A video of The Snowy Day (Viking, 1962) by Ezra Jack Keats, for example, is paired with Snowy Weather Days (Children’s Press, 2006) by Katie Marsico.
“Our goal was to create an Internet-delivered product that would be easily accessible to young students and that would help to build a love of reading and learning,“ says Duncan Young, general manager of BookFlix, adding that the site also offers lesson plans.
BookFlix has 120 fiction and nonfiction titles, 15 of which are available in Spanish. An additional 40 titles are expected to be added by the end of the year. The Web site, which targets the pre-K to third-grade market, is available for $1,259 annually and includes remote home access for parents and kids. “The ebook market for children is full of possibilities,” Young adds. “There is no product like BookFlix.”
