What does an EdTech company do when parents and teachers are demanding less screen time?

Experience

What is Kiddom?

Kiddom is a digital learning environment that integrates proprietary technology and tools with K–12 curricula. 

By adding features and functionality to expert curricula … known in the industry as High-Quality Instructional Materials (HQIM) … Kiddom makes it faster and easier for teachers to plan, teach, assess, and report.

Schools choose the Kiddom digital experience, print materials, or both to drive the continuous improvement of instructional decisions, school/district programming, and professional learning.

Curriculum

What are HQIM?

High-Quality Instructional Materials (HQIM) are educational resources that align closely with academic standards and are designed to be user friendly for both teachers and students, as defined by EdReports, a leading third-party curriculum reviewer. HQIM are vetted, comprehensive, evidence-based curricula verified for academic rigor.

While HQIM are free and well-funded through a mix of federal, state, and philanthropic sources, they frequently fall short in providing the technological features that students and teachers expect. Kiddom’s digital enhancements (e.g., personalization, dynamic assignability, and AI assistants) make using HQIM faster and easier.

Methodology

Designing Curriculum

Education is evolving, and so must our approach to content development. Because I have more publishing experience than almost all of my colleagues, my prior classroom and EdTech experience gave me a valuable perspective on what would meaningfully impact learning and what wouldn’t.

I found myself introducing pedagogical concepts that must be part of any platform—print or digital (such as Instructional Model, Scope and Sequence, Learning Path, Planning, Pacing, and Differentiation)—as well as the fundamentals of schema and automated print production. 

I was supportive of other departments, including User Research, Product Design, and Engineering, and consistently brought interesting ideas to the table, which helped bring the various departments together to improve the product.

Schema

What is Schema?

Schema for publishing involves a structured content model (often using XML or JSON) that defines the elements and rules for content to be automatically formatted and published across multiple channels.

The content uploaded to the Kiddom platform was not being tagged with XML, as the content hub was designed solely for a digital workflow. In fact, many of my digital-only colleagues were unfamiliar with multichannel publishing, a content delivery method that distributes a single piece of source content to multiple formats for distribution on multiple channels.

As one of the few team members with expertise in automated print publishing, I took on the dual role of evangelizing educating colleagues—advocating for the implementation of Schema, alongside the adoption of enterprise-level content and digital asset management systems.

Collaborating with the engineering team, I helped outline a workflow plan for a multichannel publishing approach. I also recommended that the company consult with automated publishing experts who could assist in defining and implementing a multichannel publishing system.

Analysis

Exploring Kiddom

I initiated the discovery phase by conducting interviews with colleagues and stakeholders in various departments. Through these discussions, I learned that the Product Design team had prioritized the design of the platform over the enhancement of the ingested curriculum.

While reviewing the platform, slide decks, marketing collateral, and print books, I noticed recurring patterns, common themes, inconsistencies, and gaps across these different resources. UX researchers shared reports containing detailed customer feedback and insights.

As a multidisciplinary designer, I evangelized the importance of understanding print versus digital learning because I had a keen sense of what truly moved the needle on learning outcomes, regardless of format.

Synthesis

Putting it All Together

I was asked to work with the Illustrative Mathematics v.360 K–12 curriculum. Through a comprehensive analysis of the curriculum, I identified instructional patterns that would benefit from refinement and enhanced visual representation. My goal was to boost engagement, accessibility, and brand alignment. In line with feedback from nearly every curriculum I have developed, educators consistently highlighted the need for a reduced page count.

I organized my findings into two categories:

Noticing that content was shared between the teacher and student materials, I proposed a more efficient production solution which would help reduce page count:

• placing the Annotated Answers (annos) on a separate layer within the Student Workbook InDesign files
• importing the Student Workbook InDesign files directly into the Teacher Edition InDesign files (instead of importing the Student Workbook pages as images)

This approach facilitated automatic updates for all associated documents, significantly reducing production time. Additionally, it established a “single source of truth” instead of duplicating content, thereby substantially minimizing the risk of errors by eliminating the need to typeset and proofread the same content across multiple files.

In the original printed books, the Annotated Answers (annos) provided to the teachers were positioned below the Student Activity redux, resulting in increased page count. Sometimes, the annos and their corresponding Student Activity were positioned on different pages, making it more challenging for teachers to follow and understand the instruction.

By placing the annos in context within the Student Activity, teachers receive instructional support at point-of-use and overall page count is reduced.

A sample page below shows how a Student Activity (shown at left) is imported into the Teacher Edition (shown at right) at a reduced size and is labeled as a Student-Facing Task for teacher instruction.

After learning that Student-Facing Activities were comprised of a series of questions identified by type, I designed a distinct structure and format for each type of question and its corresponding response. This would allow the print product to visually align with the content contained in the Kiddom platform. Teacher feedback highlighted the need for visual consistency between the digital and print versions and drove these improvements.

I emphasized the necessity of appropriately sizing all fillable response sections, ensuring clear communication of intent. Although the digital form fields were designed to be expandable, the print version required the space allocated to be proportionate to the length of the correct student responses. To keep everyone aligned during production, I created specific style rules for all question and response types and shared them with our editors and vendors.

I identified the Instructional Routine and planned the Teacher Guide’s page sequence and navigation. I also identified the unique text types to tag and map to schema for an automated publishing workflow.

Ideation

Defining the Design System

When comparing the digital platform to the existing print product, I observed that in both:

• the text mainly appeared in black, with only minor differences in font size among different types of text
• the layouts lacked the usual design elements commonly found in curriculum materials
• most of the content was formatted in a similar way, making navigation and understanding somewhat difficult

This also led to questions about whether and how the two mediums were intended to complement each other.

First, I identified existing graphic elements from:

• the book cover design: grade-level color palette and background patterns
• the user interface (UI): navigational iconography
• marketing: brand color palettes, typography, iconography, and other visual elements

I designed unique, replicable components customized for each content type, ensuring their seamless integration across both digital and print platforms. Objectives included:

• establishing a clear, consistent, and intuitive navigation framework
• engaging learners by highlighting and differentiating instructional elements
• enhancing legibility and reducing cognitive overload

Student Workbook

Design System Components

A design system comprises a comprehensive set of building blocks and standards that ensure the consistent appearance and experience of products. Its components deliver visual uniformity, while standardized patterns and predictable layouts minimize cognitive load. As users become familiar with these components, they can more easily navigate pages and features within the curriculum.

The sample pages below demonstrate the transformation in print layout before and after the implementation of the design system. On the left is the Kiddom print before the design system was applied. On the right is the Kiddom print after the design system was applied. Notice how each page type is now more structured, vibrant, and engaging for students.

Teacher Edition

Design System Components

A design system comprises a comprehensive set of building blocks and standards that ensure the consistent appearance and experience of products. Its components deliver visual uniformity, while standardized patterns and predictable layouts minimize cognitive load. As users become familiar with these components, they can more easily navigate pages and features within the curriculum.

The revisions to the Teacher Edition were substantial. Tasked with the primary objective of reducing the page count, I developed a continuous flow system that effectively eliminated unnecessary white space. 

To accurately assess the impact of the design system implementation on the print product, let’s compare a unit of instruction from the original version with the updated version.

Kiddom Teacher Guide BEFORE Design System Implementation

Kiddom Teacher Guide AFTER Design System Implementation

Development

Implementing the Design System

To facilitate production and ensure consistency:

• I converted the prototypes into structured templates, organized by grade level, component, and page type to be utilized by external production vendors.
• I launched a dedicated Wiki to centralize our style rules, ensuring team members could implement the design system accurately and consistently.
• I authored comprehensive style guides to standardize global design rules, file naming conventions, best practices, and guidelines for mathematical typesetting.