August House Announces New Partnership with Let's Read App

August House is pleased to announce our strategic alliance to launch Let's Read on the Apple App Store on Tuesday, July 17. Let's Read is a state of the art reading app that enables parents to record videos of themselves reading classic stories aloud to their children and then share their personalized versions of these stories with their kids over a private, secure family network. The Let's Read bookshelf includes award-winning picture books from the LittleFolk and Story Cove collections including popular titles like, Stone Soup, The Little Red Hen, Go to Sleep Gecko, Anansi and the Pot of Beans, Tale of Two Frogs, and more!

Let's Read was originally conceived by a busy mom, Ava Barnes, who wanted to read aloud with her kids more than her schedule allowed. After a series of experiments, she combined the timeless ritual of story-time with mobile technology so she could use her iPad to read stories aloud to her kids. She convinced her husband, Chris a successful software developer, to build an app that would make it easy for other busy families to read aloud to their kids. After a number of iterations and tests with other families, their perseverance paid off and the Let's Read app is now available for Apple iPhones and iPads.

The app is based on the premise that whether a busy mom is away on business, a dad is stationed overseas on an extended assignment, or grandma simply wants to bond with her grandkids, children can use Let's Read to see the people they love share the stories they enjoy. Now busy families can use their Apple mobile devices to easily create personalized reading experiences that extend story-time throughout the day.

Research highlights that reading stories aloud not only feels good and helps families bond, but it can have long-lasting cognitive and emotional benefits for a child. So instead of feeling guilty about the harmful effects of screen-time, parents can feel confident that their kids are watching and listening to language-rich stories.

Steve Floyd, president of August House pointed out, "When I first met Chris and Ava, I was intrigued to learn that kids preferred to see and hear their parents read stories to them rather than a famous actor like Meryl Streep or Robert DeNiro. I was also impressed that the Alpha test-version of the app generated over 182,000 downloads."    

August House is a highly acclaimed and award-winning, multimedia publisher of children's picture books, folktale anthologies, scary story collections, and resource books. August House has developed one of the most highly respected collections of folktales from the world's great oral traditions. You can find more information about August House at augusthouse.com or on Facebook and Twitter.