I never heard of a tween before my daughter became one. Now, the term is a regular part of my vocabulary.

Justice, clothes for tweens. Disney Channel, shows for tweens. Miley Cyrus, Taylor Swift and the Jonas Brothers, pop and country stars for tweens.

I even found myself Googling “best ____ for tweens recently when looking for that particular something to buy for Christmas. (I can’t tell you what; my tween reads, too!).

Recently an e-mail came across my computer: “Tweens Take Over Christmas.”

Oh, my.

The press release was titled “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot like Tween Christmas” and listed the five top toys of the season.

You guessed it. Games for Nintendo Wii and DS, Playstation and Xbox 360 topped the list. Of course, if your tween doesn’t have a Nintendo or a Wii, that big ticket item is a must.

The company that sent that press release said it was seeing a big increase in the so-called “age compression” phenomenon, where children leave traditional play categories at younger ages for more sophisticated products.

According to the release from IBIS World, manufacturers were once slow to respond to this shift in demand, which initially created a lost opportunity for the toy industry.

But in the last decade this gap in the product market has been addressed with the introduction of a tween market, which provides a transition from tot to teenage years. 

Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen were perhaps one of the more driving forces for this market, paving the way for the popularity of Hillary Duff and now Hannah Montana.

Over the past five years, the toy and game industry has been trying to take advantage of evolving consumer trends and technological advancements in order to maintain its customer base.

“Kids these days are different than those of the past. They’re tech savvy and get bored easily,” said George Van Horn, a senior analyst with IBIS World. “For these reasons, it’s no surprise there’s a large demand for interactive ‘youth electronics,’ like Nintendo DS and Playstation.”

Things are so different these days than when I was growing up.

I wanted board games. I wanted a stereo and some albums (or eight-tracks). There were no iPods; there weren’t even CD players (or CDs, for that matter). I remember mood rings and Pet Rocks, pogo sticks and Easy Bake ovens. And of course, we all wanted a 10-speed bike. That was so much way cooler than a three-speed or five-speed.

And I couldn’t wait for the day I could get a phone in my room. How boring that would be for our tweens today. That phone needs to be mobile and go everywhere all the time.

Times really have changed, haven’t they? My daughter wants a laptop for Christmas. We never even knew there would come a day when laptop would be a common word.

After all, the Jetsons didn’t have one, and they were the wave of the future.

Sandy Cunningham is publisher of L’Observateur. She can be reached at sandy.cunningham@wickcommunications.com.