Children Need Role Models
Spiderman, Superman, Black Panther — As children, we were each inspired by role models who embodied the traits and values we aspired to possess. These heroes, whether they were astronauts, sports players, or even fictional characters, helped us develop into the people we are today. We want to bring the power of role models to children with Social Communication Disorder by introducing them to personalized digital heroes in an engaging and approachable way. By identifying with these heroes and their unique strengths, children can build confidence in their own abilities and find their own voice. Our goal is to provide a safe and approachable space for children with SCD to grow and develop, one daily challenge at a time.
Social Communication Disorder (SCD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that affects a person's ability to use language in social contexts leading to difficulty with social interaction and communication.
Children with Social Communication Disorder (SCD) often struggle with effective communication, which can lead to difficulty forming and maintaining relationships with others. Existing solutions for helping children with SCD improve their communication skills can be dry, repetitive, and unengaging, leading to a lack of motivation and progress. There is a need for a new approach to help children with SCD build their communication skills in a way that is personalized, fun, and engaging.
Challenge:
Design a mobile app that will help those with communication disorders express themselves through creative digital mediums that can further help them build their sense of community and belonging
Solution:
Curio is a gamified daily challenge app aimed at helping children with Social Communication Disorder improve their communication skills through personalized digital heroes
-
UI/UX Designer, User Research, Wireframing, Prototyping
Designing a child-friendly challenge interface and roadmap
-
Figma
-
Andrew Kim, Kirsten Kim, Ryan Jung
-
48 Hours
How Does it Work?
Children will create their own hero to lead them through their daily challenges. This hero will complete tasks with the child and will grow and develop skills with the child.
The child will be given 3 challenges a day to complete and upload onto Curio. Each day, the challenge will increase in difficulty, helping the child improve. their social skills. Users will be awarded badges as they develop stronger skills.
Some example challenges include:
Tell me about your favorite class!
Share a favorite toy or item with someone in your family.
Ask someone a question about their day and listen to their response.
Make a phone call to someone and ask them how they're doing.
Once challenges are uploaded, the child can see their friends challenge submissions and can react to them with emojis to build community. We hope this can be a way for children to build and maintain relationships with friends.
Finally, parents will be able to track their children’s progress through an analytics page. Curio tracks social development through the number of tasks completed, amount of time required to complete a task, and submission data, letting parents rest easy knowing their child is improving their skills through these challenges.
1. Customize your hero!
Parent will log in and child can build a hero with traits they want their hero to have!
2. Complete 3 Daily Challenges!
Children will be given 3 challenges each day to complete and upload on Curio. The challenges will increase in difficulty each day and will utilize a variety of mediums like video, voice recordings, and drawings.
3. See Your Friends Challenges!
Once the 3 challenges are completed, the child can see their friends submissions and react with emojis!
Challenges:
Designing for Children:
One of the biggest challenges we faced during the design process was balancing the need for a child-friendly app with a modern, attractive design. We had a full mockup prepared in advance that we thought would be perfect for our target audience, but when we tested the app with users, we quickly realized that it felt dated and unattractive.
To address this feedback, we went back to the drawing board and completely overhauled the design, incorporating larger, more engaging buttons and a more contemporary design style. While this added extra time to the design process, we ultimately believe that it was worth it to create a more engaging and enjoyable experience for our users.
This experience taught us the importance of user testing and being willing to pivot our design approach when necessary. We also learned that designing for children requires a careful balance of fun and engaging elements with a modern, polished design aesthetic. Moving forward, we will continue to prioritize user feedback and use it to inform our design decisions, ensuring that the Curio app remains an effective and enjoyable tool for children with Social Communication Disorder to develop their communication skills.
Limited Time:
A major challenge was the time crunch, as we spent a lot of time ideating and had to pull an all-nighter to finish the project. Working with two other designers was helpful, but we needed time to adapt to each other's design processes. Moving forward, we will prioritize effective communication and time management to ensure high-quality designs that meet our clients' needs without burnout.
Final Thoughts:
Overall, this was an exciting and extremely rewarding design experience. We created this for USC’s CreateSC23 designathon and was the only USC team to place in the top 10! Huge shoutout to Ryan Jung and Kirsten Kim for committing 100% to this for 48 hours!