A three-year old checks out one of the new Seedling touchpads geared toward young children. –
Yadkin County has announced its participation in the ApSeed Program. The ApSeed Program provides free Seedling touch pads loaded with educational apps to improve literacy skills, targeting at-risk children ages 0-4. The Apps help children learn colors, shapes, letters and numbers by requiring touch and interaction. The touchpads will be distributed through the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program. Distribution of the touchpads began at the end of December.
The Seedlings (touchpads) look very similar to an I-Pad mini or a Kindle Fire, but do not provide access to the internet and only have age appropriate applications (Apps) on them. Children can read stories, draw, listen to music and even make videos on the Seedlings. The Seedlings come in a rubber protective carrying case to help them be more durable and if one should get broken or quit working, ApSeed will replace the Seedlings at no cost and with no questions being asked.
The Program is being made available in Yadkin County through a very generous donation from the Prim Family Foundation.
According to the ApSeed website, a study conducted by Hart & Risley in 2003 showed that lower socio-economic status children hear 30 million less words than higher socio-economic children before entering kindergarten. The goal of the program is to narrow the word gap by providing the touch pads to get children ready for kindergarten. The children will be age proficient to grade proficient.
The Seedling touchpads were first distributed in 2016 to two Head Start programs in Rowan County and as of 2018, over 5,000 had been distributed to daycares, pediatric clinics, NC Pre-K programs, as well as WIC in Rowan and Davie Counties.
Board Chairman Kevin Austin said, “We are excited to bring this program to Yadkin County to help prepare our children for kindergarten. We want to give them the best opportunities to help them succeed.”
Laken Royall, WIC supervisor for Yadkin County, said the first client to receive one of the tablets was thrilled.
“The mother stated the three-year old little boy had never had anything like the tablet before, and she was very thankful. Once he got his hands on the actual tablet he was so excited,” Royall said.
A three-year old checks out one of the new Seedling touchpads geared toward young children.
