Daycare End to End App Case Study

OVERVIEW

Background

Childcare centers are increasingly adopting technology and mobile apps to improve communication with parents. Effective communication between educators and parents is crucial for guiding a child’s development, interests, growth, and health. However, many childcare centers and educators still struggle with outdated workflows or existing digital childcare apps, leading to inefficiencies in parent communication and workflow management.

Problems

One significant problem was that early childhood educators struggled to use the app while looking after their students. Even though they took turns updating the children’s activities in the app, it was challenging to use it while working, which led to frustration among the educators.

Solution

As someone that used to work in Early Childhood education, I met many educators who struggled to report daily progress in an efficient manner to parents on a daily basis. This inspired me to develop an app that improves communication and benefits both educators and parents. I firmly believed that there was an opportunity to enhance their workflows with the ultimate goal to foster a positive approach to the child’s growth and development.

OVERVIEW

Background

While working in a childcare, I saw how much time and energy educators spent struggling with outdated daycare apps. These tools were supposed to make communication easier, but instead, they created friction and distraction. Educators were often focused more on logging updates than on engaging with the children.

This inspired me to design a tool that fits naturally into their workflow, improves the quality of communication, and lets them stay present with the children.

Problems

Distraction from Children

Educators needed to focus on caring for children, but updating the app took time and attention away from them.

Missed or Unclear Communication

Important messages to parents were sometimes rushed or forgotten, causing confusion or sounding unprofessional.

Confusing and Frustrating Interface

Other apps had too many steps and unclear layouts, bugs, which made them hard to use during busy times.

Solution

Smarter Workflow

Educators can use voice commands to open the app and quickly record activities like naps, meals, or diaper changes.

Clear and Professional Messages

The app suggests messages based on each child’s routine, helping educators reply fast and keeping communication clear.

Simple and Easy to Use

Peek-A-Boo fits naturally into the educator’s workday. Every step was simplified to reduce screen time and keep focus on the children.

Simply click a button to update children's activities

Use suggested messages to save time and keep communication consistent

1. DISCOVER

Discovering What Educators Truly Needed

Based on my own experience in childcare, I had already observed the challenges educators faced while using daycare apps. But to make sure these weren’t just personal observations, I validated the problems through one-on-one interviews with four participants, including both educators and parents.

These conversations helped me understand not only the technical frustrations but also the emotional stress caused by juggling updates while caring for children. Parents also shared how inconsistent or missing messages made them feel disconnected from their child’s day.

This early discovery process gave me a clearer picture of the areas of concern from both sides and helped shape a solution that truly supports everyday classroom communication.

Conducted via

Zoom | In person

Age Group

20-40

years old

Participants

Here’s what some of the educators and parents shared during the interviews:

Jin | Educator

Having a daycare app is not helping our workflow efficiently. In fact, it seems to be creating extra work.

Anna | Educator

A daycare app is helpful for tracking children’s activities, but it can distract educators from watching children.

Anela | Parent

Finding a suitable time to discuss my child with educators is challenging due to their busy schedules.

Key Insights Uncovered:

After synthesizing the feedback from interviews, I identified three key themes that educators and parents consistently brought up.

Reliability

Educators experience frustration due to frequent errors in their current daycare app, highlighting the need for a stable and user-friendly interface.

Efficiency

There is demand to have a simplified user interface which helps make workflows easier while considering the reality of educators having to watch multiple children.

Digitization

Removes the friction of missed paper/verbal updates and difficult direct conversations. It empowers educators and parents with instant digital notifications and activity updates, ensuring seamless, real-time information exchange.

See more insights

Competitive analysis

By focusing on key criteria for an objective assessment, I aimed to deeply understand the daycare app market, identify competitors, and strategically position my app for distinctiveness.

Competitive Analysis

The key insights are :

Competitor apps often overwhelm educators with excessive features, reducing their effectiveness and usability.
Despite having well-structured features, competitor apps struggle with engaging parents either by focusing only on educator reporting or have a lack of communication or benefits for parents to use the platform.
The analysis highlights the need for prioritizing communication and engagement features that foster a strong parent-teacher partnership.

2. Define

How Might We?

How might we enhance an educators’ workflow to help them better care for their students?

What is the most important aspect of the project?

With limited time, I prioritized enhancing educators’ workflows over fostering communication between users. Reflecting on my goals and user frustrations, I realized improving workflows would also positively impact communication with parents, addressing both needs effectively.

User persona

I created two user personas, as I am focusing on both educator (Nancy) and parent (Mackenzie) perspectives. I wanted to gain a deeper understanding of their respective needs in order to design the best features to support each child's growth and development.

User Persona (Educator)

smiling woman wearing white and black pinstriped collared top

Nancy Lucie

I nurture confident, curious learners by creating a loving space where every child feels seen, heard, and inspired to grow.

Key Need

A simple, easy-to-navigate app that helps educators share children’s learning and stories with parents effortlessly.

Key Frustration

Feeling overwhelmed by the amount of administrative tasks and struggling to report effectively using the current app.

User Persona (Parent)

Mackenzie Doram

Sometimes I feel left out of my child’s learning journey. I wish I could see more of what they do during the day.

Key Need

Better communication between educators and parents about their child.

Key Frustration

Late or missing updates on their child’s progress or behaviour.

Simplified Userflow

Identified several key steps essential for improving the overall experience.

3. Develop

UI Library

Wireframes

I focused on minimizing the number of steps and simplifying the interface by refining the page layout and button actions. The goal was to streamline the process so educators could update activities quickly and stay focused on the children, rather than spending time navigating the app.

4. Testing

Testing Final Product

Conducted via

Zoom | In person

Age Group

20-40

years old

Participants

Key Takeaways from usability testing:

Participants mentioned that the icons throughout the platform were slightly small and they required larger buttons in order to accurately click the buttons.
Some participants noted that the main page was too plain and lacked impactful colors, which may make users feel bored or disengaged.
Most participants felt that the "suggested replies" feature was hidden and suggested displaying it in an area where users can easily access it.

CONCLUSION

This design journey deepened my understanding of how impactful products are born from a blend of empathy, strategic thinking, and rigorous testing. It reinforced the power of focusing on genuine user needs and adapting insights from testing. This experience solidified my design philosophy: that truly useful and delightful solutions are crafted through continuous learning and a commitment to improving people's lives.

About

Resume

Peek-A-Boo

Peek-A-Boo

Simply click a button to update children's activities

Use suggested messages to save time and keep communication consistent

CONCLUSION