Designing a Magical Reading
Habit for Kids
My role
Staff Product Designer.
End-to-end, from discovery to delivery and repeat.
Team
2 Product designers, Product Manager, 4 Engineers, 2 Marketing, 1 Content and CEO.
Company
AI-powered personalized stories for kids and families.
DELIVERY
Once upon a time…
A world where reading is always the first choice for children.
Explore
Recommended stories
Titles that speak the family's language. Visual cards with illustration like book covers and short description, so kids can help choose!
Create Story
Turning personalization into a playful moment
Reduced the number of steps while keeping the most meaningful choices. Micro-interactions to keep kids engaged while the story is being generated.
Read Story
A calm, comfortable and magical reading environment
Voice over, play/pause animation and font setup to keep the story “alive” without distracting, so both adults and kids can read easily
Daily streak
Celebration screen with a gentle motivation after reading
A simple, friendly calendar showing consecutive reading days. Copy focused on celebration, not pressure!
A plan for forgiveness mechanics (e.g., not breaking everything if they miss a day, or offering “catch up” chances) to avoid guilt.
To understand how we arrived at this solution, here’s the challenge we were facing.
CONTEXT & PROBLEM
Why don’t families read
with Yuna every day?
Parents loved the idea of personalized stories,
but that didn’t automatically turn into a consistent reading habit.
Yuna creates personalized stories where kids get to become the heroes. It’s a product built to spark imagination, but also to help families read more often, together. One question shaped the entire challenge: If families love the stories, why aren’t they reading every day? Daily reading sounds simple, but real family routines are messy. Parents are tired, kids are excited, bedtime is unpredictable, and technology can either support that moment or add friction. My goal was to design an experience that feels light for parents, magical for kids, and sustainable for both.
When we started this project, we had strong activation (people trying the first story), but we were struggling with:
Low repeat usage: many families read only once or twice.
Drop-offs during story creation: parents felt the flow was “too many steps” or weren’t sure what would come next.
No clear habit loop: we wanted reading to become part of the family routine, not just a one-off “wow” moment.
COPPA: we need to do all the research and ask children's data considering COPPA rules.
DISCOVERY
Every choice need to feel meaningful
The reading experience drives everything.
Comfort, typography, pacing, and simplicity matter more than any feature.
Families need clarity, speed, and a little bit of magic.
Motivation must feel gentle, not gamified.
The magic disappears when there are too many steps.
Designing for families is beautifully complex: you’re choreographing a moment shared by a tired adult, an excited child, and a 6-inch screen. My strategy had to respect that emotional mix and turn it into an experience that feels effortless every day, not just on day one.
I anchored the work in three principles:
Clarify the journey
Parents don’t have time for guesswork, and kids don’t have patience for friction. So I reshaped the flow into a clean, predictable, end-to-end loop
Explore → Choose → Personalize → Read → Celebrate → Come back tomorrow
Predictability removes cognitive load and reduces drop-offs.
Design for co-use
A child tapping excitedly + a parent navigating quickly = chaos unless the UI is built for it.
Big touch areas, simple and expressive visuals, interactions stable under “enthusiastic tiny taps”, flow length optimized for bedtime energy levels
The phone becomes a shared storytelling space.
Motivate without pressure
Streaks should feel like a warm celebration, not a scoreboard.
Gentle and encouraging copy, visuals that focus on today’s joy, not tomorrow’s obligation and forgiveness mechanics for breaks.
This approach makes families want to return, not feel guilty if they don’t.
KEY CHALLENGES & TRADE-OFFS
Designing for families requires balancing competing needs
Depth vs. Simplicity in personalization
CHALLENGE
Too many steps slowed parents, too few diminished the magic for kids
DECISION
Reduce fields to only the emotionally meaningful ones
TRADE-OFF
Collaborated with content to preserve narrative diversity despite fewer inputs
OUTCOME
A faster flow that kept the “I’m the hero!” moment alive
Calm reading vs. Visual delight
CHALLENGE
Kids love animations but parents need a calm, focused reading moment.
DECISION
Use soft, subtle animations that enhance without distracting.
TRADE-OFF
Balance visual charm with a soothing reading environment.
OUTCOME
A calm space for parents, a magical world for kids.
Motivation vs. Emotional pressure
CHALLENGE
Streaks motivate kids but can create guilt for busy families.
DECISION
Use gentle, celebratory language, never punishment.
TRADE-OFF
Engage without pushing families beyond their real routines.
OUTCOME
Little Stars! Healthy motivation that feels uplifting, not demanding.
Ideal reading time vs. Real-life routines
CHALLENGE
Bedtime is chaotic! Parents are tired, kids unpredictable.
DECISION
Design a journey that works in just a few minutes.
TRADE-OFF
Shorter sessions with smart pacing to keep stories meaningful.
OUTCOME
A reading ritual families can actually fit into daily life.
RESULTS & IMPACT
When clarity and magic work together, families keep reading
Although I can’t share full internal metrics, early results after launch showed clear improvements in reading consistency:
More stories finished per session
Meaningful improvements in week-1 retention among users who saw the streak experience
Noticeable reduction in drop-offs during the personalization flow
Parents reported the experience felt “magical and lighter for everyday use”
Children began initiating reading sessions by asking to check their streak
The new reading environment was described as “calmer and more comfortable”
These outcomes showed that the redesign not only improved the UX, it strengthened the reading habit, which was the core product goal.
LEARNINGS
Lessons from building a habit,
not just a feature
Designing for kids means designing for adults too.
Children rarely navigate the experience alone their reading habit is mediated by a parent’s time, energy, and emotional bandwidth. A design that works for kids but burdens adults will not sustain a long-term habit. The real challenge is creating moments that feel light and joyful for both, even at the end of a busy day.
Motivation must be ethical and emotionally safe.
Streaks are a powerful behavioral mechanic, especially for children who love collecting and celebrating progress. But they must respect the natural rhythms of family life. Healthy motivation celebrates presence without punishing absence, supports autonomy, and avoids guilt-based loops. Designing for children carries an added layer of responsibility, the product must uplift, not pressure.
End-to-end thinking is what builds habits, not isolated features.
A reading habit isn’t created on a single screen; it emerges from the seamless orchestration of small moments across the journey: how quickly families find a story, how magical personalization feels, how calm the reading environment is, and how they are welcomed back the next day. Every touchpoint either reinforces the habit.
MY ROLE
Great design only happens when product, engineering, and content build together
I was the Product Designer responsible for leading the end-to-end experience, working closely with a cross-functional team. While I drove the vision, UX strategy, and design execution, this project was a deeply collaborative effort across product, engineering, and content.
Research & Strategy
Led interviews with 12 families to understand routines, barriers, and motivations
Collaborated with Data to interpret behavioral patterns and identify habit-formation opportunities
Defined the strategic question: “What prevents families from reading on Yuna every day?”
Conducted an in-depth study on child cognitive development and children learning phases
Experience Design
Designed the full journey: Choose → Personalize → Read → Celebrate → Return tomorrow (in close partnership with engineering to ensure feasibility)
Co-created personalization logic with the writing/content team, balancing narrative richness and simplicity for families.
Defined with our Craft Designer the streak experience, including behavioral logic, microcopy, and ethical motivation principles
UI & Design System
Redesigned the reading interface with emphasis on comfort and rhythm
Refined typography, spacing, and visual hierarchy for adult–child co-reading
Built reusable components and documented states, edge cases, and rules
Built variables structure on Figma to enable Tablet view
Validation & Delivery
Facilitated usability tests with families alongside PM to observe real-world reading behavior
Conducted perception tests about the feeling of magic on the app
Iterated based on what we learned as a team, from interaction quirks to the emotional tone of streak celebrations
Delivered detailed specs and implementation guidance, collaborating closely with engineering during development and QA
Feature launch with A/B testing and satisfaction metrics tracking
Overall, my role was to shape the vision, lead the design direction, and translate insights into an ecosystem families could embrace, always in partnership with an exceptional team.
This wasn’t a solo effort! It was a collective build, and the strength of the final experience reflects that.
FUN TIME!
To see more about Yuna
© 2025 Júlia Scucuglia