By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

Toronto- based Kiddology  has introduced a publishing platform through Kickstarter using real time video connections with interactive books and games to bridge families together.

A clever use of today’s video conferencing and collaboration technologies, Kiddology’s Kickstarter project has an initial $35,000 goal and it hopes to make it possible for children and remote parents or grandparents to interact by reading books together using an app on tablets. They also want to build a publishing platform for mobile devices.

Reacting to the reality that today’s mobile technology can be alienating  as many of us are engrossed in our smartphones or tablets without taking time for meaningful interaction with our families, Kiddology wants to use technology to unite families.

Kiddology  started out as an app studio with four applications that are already available on the App Store. They decided to pivot into a real-time story sharing application after seeing how ineffective most apps were at keeping families together.

“Today our platform has four stories written, illustrated and accompanied with voice overs and interactive elements. Kiddology has already been programmed to let kids pick the books or game we have in our kid friendly space, but we want to take the next step in adding the real-time video co-play features so parents and kids can be anywhere in the world and still read, play and learn together,” a Kiddology spokesperson said.

Kiddology, through their software and application,  wants families to come back as a unit and encourage paired interactivity. It is the virtual equivalent of evenings and weekends spent playing board games with parents and is particularly effective in situations where a parent may be traveling or if grandparents live remotely but still want to partake of their grandkids’ activities.

But Kiddology goes beyond being a learning platform. It gives mommies, daddies, illustrators, writers

and artists of all kinds a place to publish games and books without knowing how to code. It’s quite simple, says co‐founder Jay Kapadia.

“We love bringing families together and families love engaging with beneficial content, but we want it to be easy for everyone to craft useful content.”

 Children playing apps by themselves rarely helps them learn better. Children thrive on interaction. Kiddology keeps that in mind by introducing features that Encourage parental involvement in application,  co‐play when family members and kids are apart, and a lovable character named Kiyoshi to help in the path of learning. Kiddology has 19 days to go in Kickstarter.