By Robert Thompson

Here are some things we know about the tablet market in 2011:

• iPad will be the #1 best seller
• It will grow really fast – maybe passing 50M units
• 150 to 200 companies will try to sell you a tablet

On the other hand, what’s less clear is how all of these companies envision their tablets will be used. Will all of the tablets be aimed at data consumption like the iPad, or will other uses emerge? One potential area for tablet use that is receiving more attention lately is for early education.  This idea was recently explored by Hugo Ortega in his post, Tablets and the Learning Factor. The concept is simple: With its touch interface, tablets can help children extend their creativity using intuitive applications that allow them to color, trace letters and do simple counting exercise — the possibilities are endless.

This idea is one that Freescale also supports and has explored through research with the Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD). The first round of research completed earlier this year looked at how children ages 8 to 21 may use an optimized tablet for their desired use. The key take-away from this research was “one size does not fit all” because each age range has unique wants and needs. For example, in the 8 to 10 age range, gaming is key and would be incorporated into any design (you can read more about this research in a previous post by Glen Burchers).

Freescale just concluded another round of research with SCAD focusing on the younger 2 to 9 age group. Once again, we found that each age range has unique wants and needs. The youngest age range studied was 2 to 3. If you think a 2- to 3-year-old is too young to interact with a tablet, take a look at the following video clip. The child might not know how to spell “elephant,” but on a tablet …

In the 2- to 3-year-old age group, over 75 children were interviewed to develop detailed personas based on such factors as their environment, key stakeholders and statistics, including their most watched TV shows, interests and parent-trusted brands as shown in the chart below.

The research shows a tablet is a device that can stimulate an interest in learning through fun, easy-to-use hands-on interaction and appeal to a larger majority of children than traditional learning formats. This data resulted in a development of potential product concepts that catered directly to a 3-year-old’s needs. The children were also given iPads for hands-on interaction and more than 30 children’s apps were tested. So what did they tell us about using a tablet? If a company wants to design a tablet for a 3-year-old, it would have to overcome the following usage challenges:

• Difficulty selecting app icons due to their relative small size and the children’s lack of fine motor skills
• Needed  more tactile feedback (response) when an application was launched to ensure they were on the right track
• Had difficulty determining where the bezel finished and the active screen began – it’s a great design but for small children, a physical break/boundary is needed.
• Almost always wanted to place the tablet on the ground, not on a small desk – this improved their interaction with the tablet and improved the ability to share with others
• Multi-touch led to confusion as often the child would be touching the screen with more than one finger at a time.

Despite these challenges, the iPad allowed for a fun, interactive learning experience for the children, greatly enhanced over a traditional PC. So will the tablet market evolve and manufacturers begin to design products for specific user segments, such as early education? The answer is yes, as most of the current products on the market don’t meet young children’s needs; but it has to be at the right price point.

In the same research the parents of the children who participated were asked, “What would be the magic price point for you to buy a tablet designed for your child?” The answer: $149. As with most consumer electronic devices, the overall market volume may have to ramp to allow segment-specific designs to meet the user desired price points. However, if the tablet market reaches 50M in 2011, that might happen faster than we can learn through research, or on a tablet.

In future posts I’ll share what we learned from the other age ranges, including children ages 4 to 5, 6 to 7 and 8 to 9.