GRAND RAPIDS — School Zone Publishing Co., the 36-year-old publisher of educational software, workbooks and flash cards, says its Little Scholar educational tablet for preschoolers has been added to the inventory at Walmart.com.
The company says that in less than two years on the market, Little Scholar has become a leader in the preschool tablet marketplace, specializing in providing content that focuses on the essential learning skills that young kids will need later in the classroom.
For decades, the company has provided educational resources and tools for kids ages 3-9 years old. In 2014, the company identified the new ways in which kids of today are learning and, as a result, shifted much of its resources to developing the Little Scholar tablet. While the traditional line of materials continues, company officials said they knew they had to enter the mobile tablet market.
School Zone CEO Jonathan Hoffman says what makes Little Scholar superior is not just its larger 8-inch display, but its educational content: “It takes about 70 hours for a child to just explore all the apps, videos, books and music created specifically for the tablet by our creative studio. Let me put it another way. When we look at our key competitors, our preloaded curriculum equates to somewhere between 200 and 500 percent more content, and ours covers the essential reading and math skills kids need for future success … If a child played Little Scholar for three hours a day, he or she would accomplish 1,000 hours of reading and math skill practice a year.”
In addition to Walmart.com, Little Scholar is available at Toys R Us, Meijer, and more. The suggested retail price is $129.99.
More at www.schoolzone.com.
The company was founded by the current CEO’s parents, educators James Hoffman, Ed.D., and Joan Hoffman, M.A.