In a feisty mood today, so health warnings on the below!
There seems, in some quarters to be an orthodoxy about graphic design for
kids' web pages, which is basically:
- strong colour contrasts
- busy screen
- lots and lots of graphics-intensive eye-candy
- cartoony illustrations and, if you're especially unlucky,
- lots of "boingy sounds" activated by the navigation.
It occurs at
- The White House - http://http://www.whitehouse.gov/kids/
- Nick.com - http://www.nick.com/ , and, most relevant for us at the BL, at
- http://www.americaslibrary.gov from the Library of Congress.
And it's not just America. Within the bounds of their corporate style, the
National Maritime Museum, to pick one at random, has done similar...
http://www.nmm.ac.uk/server.php?navId=00500300i
And yet, from the studies I've read, kids are very easily distracted by
arresting material that uses these techniques. Banner ads and popups - and
anything highly interactive can take them off on an unplanned journey. (So
what, I hear you ask! - but I mean the kind of journey that gets caught up
in the nature of the interactivity rather than any key learning theme that
might underlay it - what I think some of us might jokingly call "slidy
puzzle syndrome")
Maybe the more sober, grownup style taken by The Smithsonian Institute's
site for kids is an interesting contrast - http://www.smithsonian.org/kids/
Does anyone have a strong view, maybe based in learning theory, that favours
a particular graphic design approach? Also, does anyone else think a lot of
kids (say, anyone over 11) must find the bouncy-cartoony interfaces
patronising?
And in any case, from where did the "let's make it cartoony" orthodoxy
spring? Other than sales of Transformer toys, is there any evidence that it
works?
Tim Saward
British Library
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Coming soon to the British Library Galleries
Painted Labyrinth : the world of the Lindisfarne Gospels
From 16 May to 28 September 2003
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