Empowering Parents as Teachers

There are a million things we need to know to be the perfect parents, and we can't learn them all at once. The best way to learn is in the moment, through practice, and in bite-sized chunks. On Day 1, the parent may watch an introduction video. On Day 2, they may make flashcards. On Day 3, they may play a fun game with the flashcards with no learning objectives. What is the minimal learning a parent has to do each day to feel successful?

When I worked with i-Ready, we first introduced how to play a game before we taught a new skill (teach one thing at a time). Not only does a parent have to teach a new skill (phonics), but they also have to learn how to create structure around new learning games. Parent apps should have parents practice creating routine and game structures before starting to introduce educational content. Start by having kids practice animal sounds or shapes.

When I was designing a medical manual that instructed patients to "Insert 3 to 5 ml of insulin in the needle," the patients became confused. "Is it 3 or 4 or 5? How am I supposed to make a choice?" While choice may feel empowering as a designer, it often paralyzes and removes parents' confidence.

In our app, we asked parents to choose between four different games to play with their child (it didn't matter which one they chose). Parents had to watch videos for all the games and then were not sure which one they should do. What sound should they work on? How long should they play? Are they making the right choices? None of these questions were critical, but they each created a moment of doubt for the "dreamers."

Parents wanted the opposite of choice: "Just tell me that I am playing The Floor Is Lava while working on the 'B' sound." They wanted to open up the app and have an activity ready to go with their child — no thinking or choices required.

There's no way for Spencer to know every parent's situation. A common worry was "My kid has a lot of energy, and you probably did not account for that." While mothers do not want to have to think about daily exercises, when they do see the need for a change, they need to be empowered. If the activity today is "Teach your doll" but Mom needs her son to run around, she needs to be able to switch activities. So while everything starts as directed, parents need to be able to modify the lesson with additional, optional effort.

The TCR team thought a helper bot could answer questions parents might have, such as, "My child is not engaging; what should I do?"

We put a FAQ section in the app, and no parents read it. Asking an app for help is like making a choice — it requires thinking, energy, and planning, which our "dreamer" parents didn't want.

However, they were all excited about the app working in the background making those activity choices for them. "Our algorithm sees that your child has mastered the 'S' sound, and we recommend you to move on to 'M.'" This type of AI that doesn't require input but provides clear, intelligent direction was viewed as the best feature for our future prototype.

Parents don't want to fight with their kids to learn how to read. The #1 determinant of if a parent will use the app is if their child loves it and asks to play again.

In reality, many things that make learning fun are on the parent. Is Mom excited? How does Mom handle failure? How does she celebrate successes? We need to help Mom sell our app. We know this "fun factor" is critical for the app and will be prototyping new ways for apps to empower parents to make learning fun.