#Wepals Web Platform Design
I’m working with team to strategize how to help kids who are stuck at home during Covid-19. Here’s the story.
More about #WePals
WePals comes from the dream and vision of an eight year old girl. We aim to connect kids all around the world, giving them a community and a a curation of fun and learning resources in the digital environment. How might we connect children to play, make friends, and feel included?
This project came into fruition as a volunteer project in response to Covid-19.
Project Overview
UX Designer & Visual UI Designer (on a team of 6)
Contributions: UX Designer, Designer Thinker, Branding & Logo Design, WordPress Editor
Tools: Figma, WordPress, Miro, Google Docs
Duration: 4 months in, on-going
Problem/Opportunity
As we know, Covid hit abruptly early 2020 and took the world by storm. While it’s not the apocalypse, young children’s lives have been especially hit hard, leaving them feelings of isolation and boredom.
Solution
We are working on designing a community oriented platform for kids!
The design will showcase a curated list of games and activities, and feature contests in which kids may submit something they create and and be able to see the works of their peers. We hope this parent-approved, password protected platform will help elementary aged kids connect, play games, and enjoy free resources to ease the impact of Covid on their social lives.
Research
Children need their friends
Through our 20 research survey participants and 1:1 interviews we learned how hard it was on children to not be at school. Many parents revealed that especially the younger kids are affected.
Older kids have been more tech savvy and able to coordinate with friends without school and activities.
We asked parents to identify by which means of communication their children use to connect.
“The older kids contact friends via technology, the younger kids are more isolated.”
Discovery
Idea 1 Virtual Playdates
We researched and brainstormed virtual playdates to identify if this idea was a possible route to take. We asked parents describe a possible virtual playdate for their children.
Experiences:
Play games
Activities around common interests
Chat on a kid-friendly platform
Younger kids may show their toys, projects, or his/her room.
Personal Favorite:
“My daughter likes to build forts. So I’d imagine that she takes her tablet into the fort with a flash light, and show kids around.”
Activity needed — prompts, games, art, or conversation starters.
#1 Concern = Security
Important Factors for Parents:
90% said it is important to understand and trust the platform.
50% said personally knowing the kids involved and being able to video-chat helps.
45% said having a preset activity with limited number of kids and a time limit would make them feel more comfortable.
Requirements
Secure Platform Must-haves
Users need to set up a profile in order to have virtual play dates or play games.
Parents can choose whether their child can meet a new friend or play with their existing friends or family.
As a team we will continue to monitor interactions, user test, and problem solve to ensure a trustworthy experience.
Narrowing down an MVP
Games/Activities
Traditional group games- charades, Simon says, 20 questions
Show-and-tell
Work together on trivia quizzes
Video/Chat
For Current Friends:
Chat topics: movies, video games, school, hobbies
For New Friends:
Introduce themselves, where they live, what their hobbies are
Share stories about their schools
Play icebreaker games
Ideation
Version 1 resembled a forum
While data analysis was still in progress a forum was designed with groups created for each grade. This loose concept put us in charge of matching children with each other for virtual play dates.
We later decided not to go in this direction.
Branding
Building a kid-friendly brand
We utilized Miro to design a mood board. Bright, happy, inviting, inclusive
Messenger Kids
Nickelodeon
Imaginative/playful
Bright color palette
Iterations
#WePals V2
The current #Wepals platform is being designed using WordPress. It features:
Lofi playable games which require external video chat. (similar to JackBox)
A forum for parents via Facebook
The backstory of the mission to make a world of friends.
Curated and categorized links to activities- STEM, art and crafts, music, outdoors
Implementation
Next Steps - Getting Ready for Beta Testing
Rethink wireframes for “All games” page
UI/Branding, and interactions for individual game pages
Simplify game directions
Continue strengthening and defining our design system
UX writing for concise mission and backstory
Hiccups and Hurdles
Fully volunteer projects can lack structure
We badly needed a knowledgeable Project Manager.
The Stakeholder had a tough time sharing the workload(his baby). Which contributed to a slower than expected work flow and large drop-off rate of contributors.
The original idea wasn’t desired from users. The new scope was too large for the team to handle.
WordPress restricts our ease to implement the Figma wireframes.
The Good News
We are still working to make the platform always free, and a full fledged reality!
The Product Owner has a contact list of thousands of schools, from previous event: “World Friendship Day”
And a connection to the Boston Globe
