Bridges, Glitter, and *Spaceship Noises*: Young Children's Design Ideas for Communication Across Distance
Benett Axtell, Cheng Yin Zhu, Carman Neustaedter · 2024
Young children (3-5 years old) benefit from social connections with distance-separated grandparents and other family, but can struggle to connect in common digital settings like Zoom calls due to asymmetric needs of different generations. Additionally, they cannot currently engage independently with asynchronous family communication, such as texting or sharing media, because existing technologies rely on literacy and technical skills beyond their development. In this paper, we present the results of a co-design probe with 12 young children, collecting and analyzing their ideas for independent communications technologies. Our probe is based on age-appropriate pedagogy, using make-believe play and an original story about astronauts to create a design space that supported their agency as designers. Our young designers’ detailed ideas incorporated broader systems of communication. From those ideas, we present design considerations, including making connection and transmission across devices transparent and integrating learning about wireless communication into their everyday use.