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KidTREK: a Safe Journey App for Kids
Written by Brittney M., 6th Grade and Cencere S., 7th Grade
We are
concerned about the safety of children as they travel from location to
location. As middle school students in Chicago, we are coming to and from
school on our own every day. We also have to go to our friends’ houses,
family’s houses and activities by ourselves. A lot of times we feel nervous.
Our parents, teachers, friends and family members are always worried about us
too. They call us to make sure we’re safe. We worry about wheter we can call
911 fast enough if someone comes to bother us. We worry about bullies trying to
bother us. We want an app that helps the people who care about us track where
we are and see if we are safe.
If you
register KidTREK with a parent, guardian, or school you will be able to track
your child or student when they leave from where they are coming from and when
they arrive home or where they are going. You will get a text when your child
leaves their location with a link to their changing location and another text
when they arrive at their destination. This text feature uses GPS Tracking.
Another feature we have is when a school or a parent wants to track that child
at any time they have the ability to do that. If they feel like that child is
in danger they can track them. It will also have automated tips about crossing
the street. This means the app will use GPS to know when a child gets close to
a cross walk so it can give automated safety tips. For example when you are
approaching a side walk it reminds you to look both ways which could be helpful
(could be turned off). This app can tell you where police stations are and when
you are near one (can be turned off). We are also excited to let you know that
our app has a program that will invite neighborhood businesses apply to become
KidTREK certified Safe Havens. This will allow kids to go into this place if
they feel like they are being followed or are in danger. The business will call
911 or their parent. To identify these locations, the windows will have a
certified sticker.
Our
primary audience for the app is for adults and children. Both are able to use
this app. You have to have an adult register with the app and the child will
have the app on their phone. Schools can also be an audience. If a school has
an after school club or program, and wanted to make sure that the children get
home safely, they can register with the app as well (with parent permission.)
Older brothers, sisters and cousins could also register with the app to help
their younger relatives get home.
To create
this app, we used STEM processes in many ways. We started by using technology
first and then incorporated every thing else bit by bit. We used the scientific
method to come up with our design. We
identified a problem, hypothesized some solutions and then started to test our
solutions by taking polls and doing research on the Internet with each other.
First we
used a learning management system called Schoology to brainstorm problems in
our community. Then we took polls about some of our ideas for apps that could
solve them. We used our iPads to collect and analyze our data from these polls
and collaborate to discuss the results. As we looked at the data we thought
about if our app would have relevant features for our primary audiences and if
it would be easy for them to use.
We used the
Internet to find out if there were similar apps and how our app could be
different. We also looked at articles and websites about safety. We also used
the Internet to research ideas for our app’s name. We wanted a name that was
unique and not used by a lot of other websites or another app.
We used
math when we were looking at the concept of mapping. We thought about map scale
and how the mapping program would work. We also used math when we collected
data from our peers and analyzed it as a team.
By using
this STEM process, KidTrek was then born. This is an app that will help kids in case
of any problem while walking home.