The project consists of 2 major elements:

1. The web site and content database
2. A system for the collation and reporting of research data (see Research Result Scenarios)

The research can be followed up offline with email controlled focus groups to understand outcomes better.

The web site will offer early learners, with the aid of care-givers, a tool to find and use content in the form of games, songs and stories (not necessarily educationally focused). It will be possible through a graphical interface (under construction), for the child, alone or with assistance, to select content. The content that is found to be most engaging or requested by a child can be added to a personal list, via an updateable 'My page' mechanism.

It will also be possible for caregivers to build a 'my page' for a child with recommendations or required games. Taking this area further, it will be possible to build school based 'my pages' that could pyramid down to individual classes within the school and then to individual children within the class, the recommended content controlled by the teacher/caregiver.

It will be possible to vote for particular content and write an opinion. The votes will be averaged and used to update the three values placed on content:

• Educational
• Fun
• Playability

The children will not be able to vote on the educational value. All comments will be monitored before being added to the site.

The huge database of content will be available and searchable by a caregiver or by an older child independently, through separate interfaces.

The site will offer researchers a tool that can accumulate data from:

• Small, medium large or very large populations of subjects
• Single subject types in a restricted location to worldwide populations and every type of geographical grouping in-between
• A single language group or alternative language groups

It will be possible to measure the effect of many types of usage on the educational level of the child. Some theoretical examples:

• Why particular content is chosen
• How long, how often, and why particular content is used
• Who, by age, sex, and socio-economic group, etc., uses what content within a free choice environment and then, with caregiver interference
• How educational based content can incorporate lessons learned from the children’s choices and to provide a more stimulating environment and improve outcomes
• How content effects a child’s overall familiarization with computers as a tool of learning
• How non-native language content effects the child and whether it can be used to aid additional language acquisition
  

The above examples just touch on the possibilities. The site seeks to attract very large numbers of visitors. This will allow researchers to look at large scale results, potentially in the tens of thousands, as well as to focus on much smaller samples.

The tools being constructed and tested will offer researchers, from a wide range of early learner and educational disciplines, a number of options for data acquisition. They might also use purpose-built areas of the site for specialized projects.

(see Research Result Scenarios )