In England, around 43% of children who claim free school meals are not reaching a good level of development in their reception year at school. Many of these children are behind in their language and communication skills, their literacy and their numeracy.

One of the ways to tackle this outcome gap is by supporting parents to improve their child’s development at home. Digital tools such as apps, online games and websites could be part of the solution. Recent research found that around a fifth of children aged 0-4 are using digital devices on a daily basis and this increases to nearly a third of children in lower income households.

In this project we looked at the technologies available to parents and children in the early years to understand more about what digital tools are available, what parents like and dislike about them and how they are being used.

In a collaboration between Nesta’s fairer start mission and Discovery Hub teams, we used data analytics to map the digital tools available, including tools developed to be used by parents and tools for use by young children before they start school.

Our analysis explored the range of mobile apps relating to parenting and child development. We sought to categorise these apps, look at app development trends and identify which types of apps are most widely available and most frequently downloaded.

​​To learn more about innovation trends around a wider range of digital parenting technologies, we used the Crunchbase business information platform to analyse companies and venture capital investments in this space.

We also worked with our Discovery Hub to sense the future direction of parenting technology development and to ultimately use the findings to inform our future work programmes.

The questions that we consider particularly important are:

1. what mobile apps and other digital technologies are available to parents and young children (aged 0-5) to support child development?
2. which digital technologies are most popular, for example, measured in terms of the number of users?
3. what do parents value and dislike about apps that support child development?
4. what are the user demographics of the digital technologies for supporting child development?
5. what factors affect the use and impact of these technologies, such as, for example, accessibility and inclusivity, gender stereotypes, in-app purchases and advertising, or privacy considerations?
6. what are the private investment trends in this space, and what types of technologies see the greatest investment globally and in the UK?
7. what is the future of digital parenting technologies?

Through this work, we hoped to engage in the wider conversation about the role of mobile apps and other digital technologies in supporting parents and creating a positive home learning environment.

We reported our findings from this analysis in the summer of 2022.