Written by Marc Brown, published by Little, Brown Books for Younger Readers, digitally produced by Living Books
Back in 1992, Living Books (a subsidiary of Broderbund Software) released its first interactive text based on a paper-based book. Straight off the back of that success came a second in the series – Arthur’s Teacher Trouble, originally written by Marc Brown (1986) – but only time would tell whether it would be heralded as being of the same calibre.
The initial software was released on floppy disk, but in 2025 it is available to run as a web-based app. As a result, it is no longer dependent on mouse-clicks to move through the text, but is optimised for use on touch-screens both for display in the classroom during whole-group instruction, but also for on tablets or laptops in small-group or individual literary experiences.
Three decades after its release, with apps of its kind in a period of explosive proliferation, we are lucky to have a plethora of ways in which to assess texts such as these critically for their merits in language, graphics, and interactive features. A picture book app such as Arthur’s Teacher Trouble is ideal to run through the VEBB matrix, created by the University of Stavanger in Norway (2025). While not groundbreaking (or even particularly interesting) in terms of its narrative quality, it does incorporate excellent language features – voiceover, text highlighted as it is being read, the capacity to read individual words again, translation into Spanish – and engaging interactive features in the form of clickable animations. However, the language itself is not particularly accessible to children who are still developing their literacy skills, the illustrations are simplistic, and the theme and length of the text impacts its feasibility as a read-aloud in the early years. The judgement from the matrix was that in two out of three areas of assessment, this may not be the best choice of text for a read-aloud or on which to base discussion. Matrix Rating: 4.5/10
Anecdotally speaking, when selecting resources, teachers will almost always look at texts (digital or paper-based) through the lens of alignment with cross-curricular achievement standards to maximise the limited time they have with their students. In terms of using curriculum documents to assess the app of Arthur’s Teacher Trouble, the Australian Curriculum Version 9.0 (Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority, 2024) has little to offer beyond being it being an example of a digital text, and an opportunity for students to demonstrate that they can open and navigate to it as per the Digital Technologies outcomes in the lower years. While students may recognise elements of the settings (home and school), the narrative structure is problematic in terms of its adherence (or lack thereof) to a linear storyline, and the characters lack depth or uniqueness from which students could model their own writing. Teacher Rating: 3.5/10
It seemed a little unfair to base my review solely on an algorithm and the edicts set forth by he QCAA, so I went straight to the intended audience and observed my five-year-old using it. He quickly became frustrated with the interactive features being disabled while the text was read aloud, and did not like the background noise (classroom ‘buzz’) when the read-aloud was finished (‘Can we make it not play?’). By about halfway through the text, he had lost interest and even the interactive elements could not entice him to continue (‘How much longer is this? Do we have to finish it?’). I believe the haptic dissonance of not being able to connect with the text physically to orient himself, and disengagement once his working memory hit its limit from navigating the text on the screen and exploring the interactive elements (Jabr, 2013) meant there was little retention of information afterwards. Student Rating: 3.5/10
As part of the text on each page was accessed via audio as an interactive I couldn’t read it aloud instead, and I found myself prompting him in terms of how he engaged technologically, but did not see any opportunities to discuss anything significant within the story. That is a huge change in the nature of our usual interactions about reading material – not necessarily for the better – and has been noted as a constant factor in reflections by others (Dobler, 2013). That said, I do recognise that having these features (text enhancement and translation) are invaluable for families for whom English is an additional language for the adults, or wherein adult literacy levels do not make it possible to facilitate intergenerational reading aloud, or where children are otherwise motivated to experience texts independently at a young age (Roskos et. al., 2014). I give the text a bonus of .5 as a result.
Overall rating as an example of digital literature for an early years audience: 4.33/10
References
Brown, Marc (1986). Arthur’s Teacher Trouble. Little, Brown Books for Younger Readers.
Dobler, E. (2013). Looking Beyond the Screen: Evaluating the Quality of Digital Books. Reading Today, 30(5), 20-21. https://ezproxy.csu.edu.au/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/trade-journals/looking-beyond-screen-evaluating-quality-digital/docview/1349588961/se-2
Jabr, F. (2013). Why The Brain Prefers Paper. Scientific American Magazine, 309(5), 48. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-reading-brain-in-the-digital-age-why-paper-still-beats-screens/
Living Books (1993). Arthur’s Teacher Trouble. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/arthur-tt
Norwegian Reading Centre – University of Stavanger (2025). VEBB – Educational evaluation of picture book apps for shared dialogue/conversation-based reading. Norwegian Reading Centre – University of Stavanger. https://vebb.uis.no/
Queensland Curriculum Assessment Authority (2024). Digital Technologies Landing Page. Australian Curriculum Version 9.0. https://www.qcaa.qld.edu.au/p-10/aciq/version-9/learning-areas/p-10-technologies/digital-technologies
Roskos, K., & Neuman, S. B. (2014). BEST PRACTICES IN READING: A 21st Century Skill Update. The Reading Teacher, 67(7), 507–511. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24573611