Spotify Launches New Kids Category To Help Parents Develop Their Children's Language Skills

Spotify announced yesterday that it has launched a new Kids category. The Kids category will include playlists focused on vocabulary and language-development activities in-between family-friendly music, according to TechCrunch.

The new Kids & Family playlists function by providing voice prompts between songs that will encourage parents to interact with their children. The voice prompts would sometimes ask questions like what song they want to play next, or even suggest an activity that both a child and a parent can do together.

The voice prompts would even encourage parents to create a dance for their kids, or suggest that parents talk back and forth with their children. Spotify worked with celebrities like Fantasia, Tyler Perry, Sarah Michelle Gellar and Wiz Khalifa to provide the voiceover narrations. Voiceovers are currently available in English and Spanish only.

As for the songs included in the Kids playlists, a diverse range of genres that are all family-friendly are present to keep the family entertained. Parents can easily find the right playlist for a particular time of the day. For example, there’s a playlist that’s intended for bedtime. There are also playlists for bath time, playtime, family road trips and parties.

There are also playlists for specific moods or genres much like Spotify’s regular recommendations. Each of the playlists are labeled with age recommendations so that parents or guardians can easily pick one that’s most suitable for their child.

“We geared the playlists toward parents with younger children because research shows that music and musc experiences including singing with children from birth can promote early brain and language developmeny, especially among children ages 0-3,” Spotify’s director of social impact Kerry Steib told CNET.

As part of Spotify’s new effort, the company is also currently working with other organizations that would help in creating more playlists under its Kids & Family category. Organizations that are said to be working with Spotify include Univision, the GRAMMY Museum, VH1, Save the Music Foundation, Fatherly, The Bump, Carnegie Hall, Gerber and ZERO TO THREE.