Academics
LapTots
The anti-screen screen app (ages 3–5): as you read a real picture book in your child's lap, LapTots shows YOU one gentle dialogic-reading question per page. Your child never touches or sees the phone. No mic, no camera, no data.
▶ Play it nowScreen-light: about 5 minutes on the screen. Most of the play happens off it, with real things and real people.
Meet your mentor
Every Spark & Anvil app has a friendly mentor character that demonstrates, asks, and patiently scaffolds learning.
Mentored by Fill-in Finch
#c46a2a Characters who teach
Meet the cast
LapTots' four reading friends (ages 3–5): each IS one CROWD dialogic-reading move. The UI faces the grown-up; the child never sees the device.
Fill-in Finch
Completion — leave a blank at the end of a sentence for your child to finish
Read chapter →
Open-ended Owl
Open-ended — ask your child to tell you about the picture in their own words
Read chapter →
Wh-Wren
Wh- question — ask a what/where/who/why/how about the page
Read chapter →
Distancing Deer
Distancing — connect the page to your child's own life
Read chapter →
Browse all chapters → · What's distributed-narrative methodology? →
What's inside
Learning goal
The anti-screen screen app (ages 3–5): as you read a real picture book in your child's lap, LapTots shows YOU one gentle dialogic-reading question per page. Your child never touches or sees the phone. No mic, no camera, no data.
Mentored by Fill-in Finch — no data leaves the device.
How LapTots handles your kid's data
- ✅ All progress, settings, and AI-generated content stays on the device
- ✅ No analytics, no tracking, no third-party SDKs
- ✅ Free — no ads, no in-app purchases
- ✅ No personal information collected from children — in line with COPPA (updated by the 2026 FTC amendments)
- ✅ No chat with strangers — play-together rooms use a short code and preset emotes, never typed messages
For you, the grown-up
The grown-up side of LapTots on Spark & Whetstone, our free site for grown-ups: Reading Aloud Well. You read a real book with them in your lap; the course is the questions to ask.
It also tells what LapTots teaches in a short course of its own.