The child-caregiver-teacher triad as a basis for design elements and user experience principles in digital environments for children's learning: A scoping review of the literature

Education providers, including schools, government organisations and not-for-profit groups increasingly provide primary-school-aged children with access to digital environments for learning in diverse content areas. Digital environments for children can include extended reality, websites, digital games and learning management systems. Children’s learning in digital environments is contingent on quality design, including embedded concepts of learning and understanding of user experience. It can be difficult for education providers to readily recognise elements of quality design in the digital environments they design, build or purchase for children. This paper reports the findings of a scoping review of the literature focussed on learning concepts derived from an understanding of the importance of the child, caregiver and teacher triad in children’s learning, including play-based learning, co-learning and teacher pedagogies. The review confirms many existing design elements as important in digital environments for children, such as meaning-making, problem-solving and engagement, but further identifies metagaming and goal setting by caregivers as potentially useful. Eleven design elements and aligned principles are identified to support education providers in decision-making about the provision of quality digital environments for children’s learning.