We as parents are constantly reminded how different one kid is from another. One can be shy, the other can be a regular Jay Leno. You add different ages to the mix and it becomes even harder to see any pattens or commonalities emerge.
Designing an app for kids 3 – 9 yrs old is full of challenges, especially as skills vary greatly among this age group. In our beta testing we learned a lot about how kids adapt quickly to our interface, and it was comforting to know that thumbnails worked well for all age groups.
We also noticed differences in patience. Often times, younger kids tended to be more patient than older kids. They would wait patiently for images to appear, videos to start up etc. Older kids would start pushing buttons around hoping that somehow their kinetic energy, like an external defibrillator, would jump-start the app to life.
A good example of this is the thumbnail flow that we use to let kids review the videos in the playlists. Younger kids would get stuck if the thumbnails breezed by too quickly, while older kids would click all over the place if we slowed it down too much.
How did we solve this? We thought about adding a speed selector so that the kids could change the speed etc. However we rejected this early on. Our rule of thumb is to only add features/functions that help kids find and play videos.
Jonathan ended up linking the speed of the thumbnail flow to the age setting. The younger the age setting, the slower the speed. Genius! Designing for kids definitely has its challenges. Finding solutions is part of the fun!
