Parenting is not easy. There is no Bible that tells parents how to raise their children the right way. Most parents are, hence, always on the lookout for tips and advice from all quarters, online as well as offline. There are many books on parents, and there are several apps too. Most of them target the busy parents, who, thanks to their strict schedules and jobs, are not able to do enough research on parenting and are forced to go for quick fixes for the problems they face. KinderPass offers a helping hand to such parents and more.

Rapid globalisation and urbanisation have posed fresh challenges to parenting. Traditional disciplinary methods may not work on today’s children who are more aware of their rights. At the same time, keeping them in the know about their responsibilities is a tall order.

Equally important are tasks such as raising them as independent, emotionally robust and thinking social animals with necessary reasoning abilities. During Covid-19 lockdown, most parents have felt that their challenges have multiplied and are now frantically looking for ways to keep the children under control while not limiting their imaginations and creative liberties.

KinderPass — a start-up launched by two young mothers, Sumedha Khoche and Shireen Sultana, — seems to have some tips to offer here.

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“The Covid-19 crisis, which has led to lockdown and work-from-home, has prompted many young parents to navigate mobile apps and set up a routine for their little ones, including the need for childcare and development, nutrition, diet and engagement activities,” says Sumedha Khoche, Founder of KinderPass.

Sumedha-Khoche-CEO-Founder-KinderPass

“We understand that young parents, especially the first-timers, tend to be presented with a lot of contradictory viewpoints on what-to-do and not-to-do for their kids,” Khoche says the problem just increases during tough times like the lockdown, where most of us are on our own, with little or no external support or guidance.

What it does

KinderPass tries to help parents understand the requirements of their little ones. According to the makers, the app makes the experience personal by bringing together elements of machine learning and deep research in developmental psychology, closely tracking the cognitive progress of its young users and recommends customised activities and solutions to the problems accordingly.

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But there are several seemingly similar parenting apps around. What makes KinderPass different? Khoche says the app not only tells “you what to do, but what difference it will make and parents can track the difference every month.”KinderPass uses machine learning and data science to understand the child’s preferences (likes and dislikes), difficulty levels in learning, stage of development and the different skills. The app has several activities for the child and reading material for the parent, based on the requirements.

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Installing and setting up the app is easy. You can link it to your Google id and create profiles for the parent as well as the children. The app takes a while to sync your preferences and start recommending activities and reading material. The free trial expires within three months and interested users can opt for monthly or yearly plans. The monthly plan costs around ₹180 a month and a year's plan is available for ₹1,450. A lifetime plan is available for ₹1,900. Premium users get three customised activities and other material every day. You can also track the child’s milestones easily using the app.

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The app’s user interface is not very appealing and less imaginative. It resembles most similar apps in the market. The articles referred are also of average quality. The makers must use more creativity while curating the articles, activities and recommended reading if the app wants to make a difference in the crowded market. It needs to be more user friendly, to start with. A few minor glitches could have been avoided.

For one, adding the birthday of a caregiver, parent or even the child is a pain as you will have to keep swiping the calendar to reach the destination date. There is no option to jump years faster or manually key in the dates. Such silly blemishes are annoying and can be done away with through an update. KinderPass targets an international clientele, but for now, 80 per cent of its users are from India. The company claims the app has been growing at 70 per cent per month.

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