From her earliest years, my daughter, Talia, was fascinated with my iPhone. With it secure in my hand, I watched her as she tried to play and interact with the screen. The same was true with my iPad, and I often used both devices to distract her when she was fussy or unhappy with the world.
Another activity we shared was reading. Even before I had children (Talia now has a little sister named Tara), I knew that I wanted them to be bilingual, so every night I would translate and read storybooks to Talia in Persian, my native language.
When Talia turned three, she started preschool, and we entered the “Why?” phase. Morning, day, and night, we would have to come up with answers to satisfy our inquisitive little girl. When I didn’t have a ready response, which I confess happened pretty often, I would Google her question and provide an easy-to-understand, age-appropriate explanation.
Talia’s curiosity rubbed off on me, and I started to ask “Why?”—but soon “Why?” became “Why not?” Talia was obviously curious about her environment, she loved mobile devices, and I wanted her to be able to communicate in her native language. “Why not combine the three?” I thought, and that’s when AppTalia was born.
The next day I searched the App Store to see if there were any Persian language apps for children. There weren’t, so I decided to create and market the first Persian children apps.
A Little History about Me
I didn’t go into the development process blind, as I’ve been in the IT business for more than 15 years, and in my last corporate job, I was a web developer for a large company in northern Virginia. Also, I am completely addicted to the computer and am a bit of a workaholic, so I knew that I had the drive and the experience to make my new dream a reality.
In March 2012, I established AppTalia, naming my new venture for my daughter, who planted the seed from her earliest days.
My background was programming, so researching how to create a mobile app was not difficult. I soon realized, however, that to bring a quality app to market I was going to need a team, including a graphic artist, a music composer, voice over talents, language translators, and a developer.
It took me about two months to find the perfect team of contractors, and our first app hit the App Store in July of 2012.
Educating Children Worldwide, One App at a Time
What’s next? Well, my ultimate goal is to create a broad curriculum of educational apps for children around the world.
I firmly believe that younger children have a tremendous amount of natural curiosity, and that we should leverage their interest, using technology to expose them to subjects beyond early reading and basic math. Also, I believe science is for everyone; it’s not for a specific gender, culture, or country. Educational apps of all kinds—including science—can be used by all children, especially if they are multilingual.