Ahh, parents. Holferty said KwikNotes can serve as a reminder for parents, a way to trigger recollections of what they learned in school years earlier and can pass along to their children.

"Sometimes all you need as a parent trying to help your child with homework is being able to remember what you learned, to have something trick your memory and be of assistance to you," she said.

In addition to basic scrolling through pages, users can click on links to get details about particular topics. Audio capabilities can, for example, provide proper pronunciations of many foreign words and phrases often used in English — can you say "carpe diem"? Users also can bookmark up to 60 pages of information for even quicker access.

Dale Niederhauser, a professor of curriculum and instructional technology at Iowa State University, has said KwikNotes "becomes an extension of the classroom teacher." Another adult has said students are "learning without realizing it."

One local school district official in Utah found KwikNotes "fun to work with and educationally sound" with a platform "that kids of all ages can use with ease." A high school student wrote the company and described the product as "easy to use" and "user-friendly," with the speed of the interface and volume of material covered as "impressive." A community college instructor found it to be "quite an interesting and useful tool for students."

The idea for KwikNotes dates back about five years, and collecting and developing information from teachers and professors took about two years. Sales of KwikNotes are in the early going, but Pocket Direct already has plans to produce individual cartridges for each subject that will be even more informative and interactive. It also is developing a GameBoy cartridge packed with information about the dangers of illegal drugs. That is being reviewed by Nintendo, and Pocket Direct is scouting for venture capital funding to advance that product's development.

"When you look at the potential of this thing, at the need that's out there, and just how much positive that can be done with this technology and the fact that nobody's looking at it from that perspective, it's disconcerting," Suarez said.

"We're using something that's a dyed-in-the-wool toy, if you will, and trying to do something different, so it's a challenge. But there's so much you could do with this technology that it's absolutely incredible not to use it this way."

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E-mail: bwallace@desnews.com