- Today, meet parents who watch their kids play and let that inspire them to become entrepreneurs.

They are inventing the products that are reinventing childhood.

From a toy that was named one of Time Magazine's best inventions of the year, to an app and subscription service that makes picking the perfect book a breeze.

To building kits that give new meaning to the term spark of creativity.

We'll also tell you about the science behind the power of play.

We're talking about parent entrepreneurs.

So stay with us, "IQ Smart Parent" starts right now.

(quirky music) Welcome to "IQ Smart Parent."

I'm your host Darieth Chisolm.

You know as parents our job is to introduce our children to a world of discovery.

But for some enterprising parents, they don't just introduce their children to new learning tools, they invent the new learning tools.

And that's our topic today, parent entrepreneurs.

Our first guests are a husband and wife team from Washington, DC.

And their business made a big splash when they pitched it on the reality show "Shark Tank."

Let's welcome Jordan Lloyd Bookey and Felix Brandon Lloyd.

Thanks so much for joining us.

Now you both have backgrounds in education, but back in may of 2013, you went down a different path and became entrepreneurs.

Tell us about your business and what inspired you to create it.

- We created Zoobean out of a real personal problem that we experienced.

So I was pregnant with my daughter and we were just looking for a book that would help show our son what it was like to be a big brother in the world.

And, you know, we're an interracial family and we wanted something that really was a reflection of us and of our experience.

And we had a really hard time finding that book.

And by happenstance, a friend sent us this perfect book, it's called "All the World" and it worked, you know, like a charm for us.

It's still a favorite.

And we realized that we could deliver that type of experience of finding just the right book for your family to many more families like ours.

And that's really when the light bulb went off for Zoobean.

- Now Zoobean has become a success.

It's been really interesting to see this obviously land on "Shark Tank."

So that has to be big.

And so how did that experience affect your business?

- [Felix] Yeah well, I think it made us turn a problem we were experiencing into a solution that would matter for lots of families across the country and hopefully beyond this country alone.

So it allowed us to define the problem that Jordan described of in this information age, actually being harder and sometimes to find what's right for your child.

And build it into a business that would deliver to a family each week, an actual book.

And now we work through public libraries to deliver a recommendation of a book at the library that is just right for that child based on their age, interest, reading level.

And all the things that go into a unique childhood.

- [Darieth] So let's talk more about Zoobean and how it works.

You know, when I use search engines, typically the most popular item rises to the top.

How is Zoobean different?

- Yeah, yeah well- - You go.

- We believe very much in the power of the human experts still.

So in the age of the algorithm, there are some things that still take a person to look at it, both to the judge the quality of it, but also the content.

So for example, we'll have a, what we call a curator, which is often a librarian, look at a book and say, "Well, this book features are not so pink girl, or it features a theme of self-confidence."

And that would then allow a family later on to express that their child, their son or daughter is a girl who was into math, science, and technology, and very different in any given day and age.

And find a book that will roll to the top for that child.

- So let's look more closely at this.

And we've actually created an account for an actual child.

- Okay.

- So we'll use a real child in this case.

She is actually one of the daughters of someone here.

- [Jordan] Oh great.

- [Darieth] Her name is Avery, she's eight and a half years old.

We even have a picture of Avery.

So we wanna take that, but let's take a look at perhaps, some of the choices that she might choose in the interest.

And what are some of the possibilities that may arise?

- So as a parent, you obviously have your age and your reading level that you can choose, but then when it comes to, you can choose genre.

So different genres might be adventure, fables, fairy tales, and folklore.

And then you also look at interests.

So interests might be, as Felix mentioned, not so pink girls, books that are about math and science, ninjas and warriors.

And you sort of pick your child's profile that you can always update and edit because they change, you know, that second to second.

- [Darieth] So in this case, Avery dares to be different.

- Okay.

- That's her choice of words.

- A good one.

- Go Avery, go Avery.

- Right?

- Great.

- So how would this work for her?

- [Felix] Yeah.

- So all of our, all of the books that are in there have been lovingly tagged by librarian curators from around the country.

And those, if any book that has been tagged with daring to be different, that book would be also in her library.

Then those books would rise to the top, along with the other things that she chose.

So there's an algorithm and a human element to it.

- [Darieth] So how, in this case, when we think about some of the other features involved, such as apps and digital badging, how is this also working together with this?

- You know, fundamentally, it's about children's literacy.

We're former teachers.

I was teacher of the year in Washington, DC.

Jordan was head of K through 12 education in Google.

And I think what we saw as important is getting kids excited about reading and making it really personal for them.

This is the right book for this child versus that.

For the services fundamentally, when you talk about the recommendations about individualizing for the child, but the badging, the ability to log books over time is really about helping that entire family get engaged and experience.

And to find it fun and to set goals along the way.

- What is your favorite Zoobean feature?

- My favorite feature is the learning tip.

So I love that with each book you're getting a learning tip that's helping you dive a little bit deeper.

And will often time be an extension that shows you how to use new media or some other element that will really help to infuse that book with even more.

- [Darieth] Felix, your favorite?

- [Felix] I think I'm into the badging.

You know, I love that element of a- - Competition.

- I wouldn't call it competition, you know, but like just this sort of visual representation of something that I and my child have achieved.

Yeah.

- So as we close in this segment, you obviously are quite passionate about this.

Where does that come from?

- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- You know, we are, I think we were always passionate about education because we're educators by background.

But it's really becoming a parent and having that experience where you see the problem and you had this experience with your own child that drives it home.

And we realized that this is, you know, such an important moment for us.

And we really have a chance to make a difference.

- [Darieth] Where does it go from here?

- Well, we're fortunate to have some good supporters, Mark Cuban's an investor.

We've been working with public libraries across the country, 35 public libraries now, including a couple in Canada.

And what we wanna see is children across the country, finding this through their local libraries and reading 10 times as many books as they would.

Becoming more literate sooner and being wildly excited about the experience throughout.

- Yeah, great.

Well, it's such a great feature and we appreciate you being here on the show.

And continued success to you.

- Thank you.

Thank you for having us.

- Thank you so much.

- [Darieth] Absolutely.

The product is Zoobean and the parent entrepreneurs, of course, are Jordan Lloyd Bookey and Felix Brandon Lloyd.

So best of luck to you again, and thank you so much for being here.

Coming up, we're going to give you a look at one of Time Magazine's best inventions of the year.

And once again, it was invented by a parent who was inspired by his own daughter and how she played.

But up first, it turns out play time is more than just fun and games.

Here's what the research tells us about the power of play.

- [Announcer] Albert Einstein once said, "Play is the highest form of research."

So what's happening inside your child's brain at playtime?

In the 1920s, a Swiss psychologist named Jean Piaget studied children, including his own.

And he determined that every experience and interaction has an impact on early childhood development.

Piaget used his findings to form the stages of cognitive development theory, which allow parents and educators to help children learn better.

(happy music) Plenty of research since then has confirmed Piaget's theories about the power of play.

Today, leading experts agree that early childhood stimulation and adult engagement is the best foundation for children to reach their full potential.

- I really looked forward to today's show because I'm getting to meet so many inspiring parent entrepreneurs.

But also because I'm getting to play with so many cool toys and this next invention is no exception.

I'm very excited to introduce you to Pramod Sharma, a former Google engineer, and now the co-creator of a device called Osmo.

And we're gonna get a chance to play with it in a moment, but it made it onto the list of Time Magazine's best inventions back in 2014.

So congratulations about that.

- Thank you.

- Tell me what inspired you to create this?

- So I have a daughter and I see little kids who love tablets and phones.

And in some cases it can be really hard to take these devices away from them.

And we realized that the experience with these the devices you're limited to the screen.

And that's very constraint experience.

So we had this insight of what if we can have the experience not limited to the screens, it can go beyond the screen?

And it can have physical objects as part of the experience?

That was the inspiration for Osmo.

And we have been amazed with how much fun kids have, parents and teachers having with this.

- [Darieth] What age is it designed for?

- It's designed for six and over.

And the games are designed in a way that the difficulty level goes up as you start playing.

So it scales very well.

- [Darieth] Does a customer need the internet in order to play it?

- No nothing.

So the apps are all open on iPad.

And what you use is just the physical pieces.

- Why do you think it made such a big impression in such a short time?

- I think this is sort of adding a new dimension to the play.

So it's not a huge jump from experience standpoint.

You already have an iPad.

You already playing physical games, now we're sort of blending them together.

So the jump is pretty, pretty small from the user experience standpoint.

- It's what they're used to and their eyes and hands are always on some tablet, so to speak.

But this red device here in the base really makes this unique.

- That's right.

- Yeah, yeah.

So let's talk a little bit about how it works.

I mean, I'd love to jump in and play a couple of games.

- All right.

- And so we'll talk about how it works and then let's play words.

- Let's start this game.

So this game is, all our games the way it works is there's a reflector on top.

That's effectively letting iPad see what you're doing in front of it.

It's all, in every single game you're playing in front of the iPad.

So in this game, this word game, the two of us are gonna play with trying to guess, we're guessing this four-letter word and picture is a hint.

So this one from (indistinct) could be a bird.

So, that's not right.

So, B and it's a fast and furious.

You don't have to wait for me.

- It's just like Hangman.

- Oh, oh, tail.

- [Darieth] Oh tail, okay.

What is the educational value of this particular game, of words?

- So this one is you, there are a couple of things actually.

One is the social and emotional learning, you're playing together.

And in classrooms you've seen when we put the game in front of kids, multiple kids come together and play.

Just doing problem-solving because you trying to guess what it is, so you have to think a lot.

And they know obvious answers to these things, so you're forced to think.

So the social emotional learning is, I think, is the big prospect of the words game.

- So let's take a look at tangrams.

- Yes, so the next game is a game of tangrams where you will see on screen, on here there's a shape.

And we have these pieces and these pieces has been around for centuries actually.

And what we're gonna do is we're gonna make this shape using these pieces.

And you can help me if you like.

So this one is actually this way.

So this one seems, feels simple.

It's actually fairly complex because of the sort of, it's like visual thinking, same way as to parallel parking, in some sense.

- So it's really helping with geometry.

- That's right.

- Yeah.

- I think it's helped in geometry, 2D thinking, visual thinking.

And in some things you're sort of making these connections in your head and expressing them over here.

- And this scales up clearly- - This scales up.

- So it starts with a young child, but it will advance as a child advances.

- That's right.

- And so, as you see, as I start competing the puzzle, it gives me a real time feedback.

- Right.

- And that's what keeps you engaging.

- So let's talk a little bit about Masterpiece.

- [Parmod] Right.

- [Darieth] Yeah.

- [Pramod] So Masterpiece is a drawing app.

What we've seen, kids love drawing when they're young.

But as they grew older, when they want to draw, let's say face.

And it's actually very hard to draw a face.

The Masterpiece lets you draw, it sort of helps you imagine what you could draw and helps you sort of give a guideline on drawing.

And what we have seen with Masterpiece is once you start drawing and kids can draw for hours.

And that's what I've seen myself as well.

I'm an engineer myself and I was amazed the first time actually I could draw a self-portrait of myself.

So that's the power of Masterpiece.

- [Darieth] Great, and so did you consult a child development experts in this?

I mean, how is it that you came to develop the games in particular?

- I think one thing we realize is if you're using a physical (indistinct) in this case, tangram, or word game, the education value is fairly obvious.

The main area of focus for us has been fun.

Is it fun, engaging?

And what we do is whenever we have an idea, you build a prototype, put it in front of kids and see how they react.

Do they play once?

Do they play multiple time?

Do the play something else if we do two things in front of them?

So for us, a lot of it is infiltrating on the fun, because if you get the fun right with this infraction, education follows automatically.

- Was your daughter part of any of this?

- Did you test a lot of it with her?

- Yes.

- Yeah.

- I think in the beginning we had a simpler version of the word game where you just toss one letter in front of it and it tells you this is right letter, wrong letter.

And it was pretty engaging.

And I was actually pretty impressed.

- [Darieth] What did she think about it?

- Oh, I think it was pretty engaging, that's why we started.

I left my full-time job and started this journey.

And it was very inspiring.

There's one more game actually, it's called Newton, I think.

- That's Newton, yeah.

- And that game is all around creative thinking.

And when we say that you can bring any physical object into the game, that's the one that enables that.

So in this case, what you will see these tiny balls falling from a screen, and your goal is to make them the target.

And the way you play this game is this, you can use your hands.

And now your hand is part of the game.

You can use, in fact, I see this bell.

In fact, this become part of the game as well.

And anything so you can imagine as anything that can sort of build a structure can become part of the game.

And I've seen with kids are gonna be interesting.

Kids actually use this with say, toothpick, getting a wire, essentially building a structure.

And that's sort of imaginative care to play is, I think, is the core promise of Osmo.

- And that, in particularly with Newton, what skill set is that helping to develop in children?

- I think, I think as the entrepreneur or one of the, the first thing people ask us to do is think outside the box.

And this is really thinking out of the box.

Like if we don't give you any constraint, other than here's a simulation digitally, but in physical space, you can use any object in any way.

And so thinking outside the box, thinking creatively is sort of core promise of Newton.

- Speaking- - And we've seen this with kids actually.

- Yeah, definitely.

And speaking of thinking out of the box and being an entrepreneur, what advice would you give to any parents who are considering starting their own business?

- Entrepreneurship is fun, but it's very hard.

You always start with an idea.

And I always focus on spending time thinking, is this the right idea?

Because if you start in the wrong direction, it's much harder to do course correction.

And the one way I think you can see whether it's the right idea area is look around yourself as a parent, teacher and kids, and see is this gonna help kids in meaningful ways?

And if this idea is gonna help meaningful way, then you will get a lot of support from other parents, teachers, and we get a lot of support from community as well.

- Yeah, well, it is such an interesting game and the creativity that goes, that's involved in it is great.

And I love the fact that, you know, kids are already glued to their digital devices, and this is a great way for them to expand and learn and have fun as well.

- We are very excited.

And thank you for having us.

- [Darieth] Yeah, absolutely.

Coming up, do it yourself projects that take tinkering to a whole new educational level.

- My bot bot robot.

- And for all you parents out there who are getting more motivated to follow your own dreams of building a business, check this out.

- [Announcer] Think you've got what it takes to build a successful business?

Check out this list of traits experts say make for a successful entrepreneur.

(happy music) If you think you have what it takes to start your own business, explore free resources available online to guide you through the process.

(happy music) - We're talking to parent entrepreneurs.

And my next guest is Tara Tiger Brown.

She's the co-creator of Kit Hub.

Welcome to the show.

- Hi, thank you.

- So a lot of us probably remember those mail order boxes, those mail order kits that used to come in the mail, things like sea monkeys to those sea agents.

And so Kit Hub is kind of the 21st century version of that, right?

- Yeah, something like that, uh-huh.

- Yeah, so tell me what inspired you to create this?

- Well a few years ago, I started the nonprofit Los Angeles Makerspace because I discovered that kids were not getting any hands-on learning inside the classroom or even outside the classroom.

And so once I also was working on that non-profit, my co-founder Luz Rivas, she started DIY Girls, which is very similar.

And we came to the same conclusion, which was that a lot of people wanted to do these same activities at home that they were doing in our community spaces.

And so we thought here's an opportunity for us to scale what we were doing locally in Los Angeles and bring that to people's kitchen tables.

- And we're gonna dive in and look more closely at the box in a moment.

But when we look at science, technology, engineering and mathematics, it's typically called STEM education, but recently there's that word has changed and it's now STEAM.

And now we're including the words art.

- Right.

- So in this case, you're really combining all of those in this kit.

- [Tara] Yeah, that's right.

And you know, at home, your parents are very comfortable, you know, bringing art to their kids, drawing, gluing things, et cetera, but they're maybe not as comfortable introducing something like electronics.

So we've blended the art with the technology.

So they're comfortable starting a project and then adding on those techie bits that, you know, otherwise they might just want to avoid.

- [Darieth] So it's really inclusive of all of those dynamics.

- Right.

- How does this work?

I mean, what do you get in the kit?

And how do people receive them?

And how often do kids receive them?

- Every kit has a theme.

And so we have a set of activities that we've designed or curated.

And then we have the electronic components that come in the kit as well.

And it's really to get the kids started.

So, you know, we start them off and then they kinda take it from there.

We have a subscription service that you can sign up for and get a kit every month.

We also have single kits that you can purchase that are also theme-based.

And really it's, you know, for kids that wanna spend a weekend working on it.

Or, you know, they want to really expand on a project that they're working over a course of three months.

- [Darieth] And so with the themes, let's talk about that.

Is it if you're interested in arts, or let's dive in a little more closely when we talk about themes.

- Yeah, so we have a few different themes.

For example, there's family game nights.

So families got together and they built their own version of the operation game or a game show.

We had a fashion technology kit where, you know, kids could make things like stuffed animals that, you know, light up.

Or, you know, little girls could light up their tutus.

We have a conservation kit coming out soon.

So kids will be able to take underwater microphones and figure out what the sounds are like under the water.

So really it's a combination of things we know kids are really interested in already.

And then the kids that purchase our kits tell us what they want to build.

So everything from a Harry Potter wand to- - [Darieth] So you can really customize this based on the feedback that you're getting from kids.

- Yes.

- That is great.

Let's look at what's inside of this kit.

- Okay, great.

So this is really a basic electronics kit.

This is also something that you'll be getting with our summer camp in a box.

So it comes with five different activities.

And the first thing we usually start kids off with is something that we call a bot bot, or it can also be called an art bot.

And kids will learn very quickly how to start a motor and light up an LED.

And then the other one here is this uses conductive thread.

So for kids that like to sew this is a good introduction to helping them light up LEDs and even programming.

This is a little programmable Arduino right here.

You know, and so we have buzzers, like I mentioned, that you can use to create different game shows.

And even something that's really interesting is this is, it looks like just a pipe cleaner, but this is actually a circuit because this is metal.

So kids quickly learn they can take a pipe cleaner and maybe make a bracelet with it and add an LED and a battery, and all of a sudden it's a piece of fashion.

- [Darieth] So they really can get creative with this?

- Yeah.

- Does it come with instructions- - Yes.

- Or do you just allow kids to tinker and play around with it?

- It does.

It comes with written instructions.

What's really funny is that the kids will open the kit and then they throw the instructions away.

And the parents are like, no, get those instructions.

The kids really like our videos.

That's really what they go to, is they look at the videos, and in fact they make their own unboxing videos.

- Hi Tara, this is Thomas from Decatur, Georgia.

And I had the kit hub bot bot.

I added a sword and a spear, but the spear's a pencil and this actually is a toy sword.

And this is the helmet.

And this is what it does.

So this is mine and this is my dad's.

I think my dad's doesn't work.

- [Dad] Yep.

What's his name?

- [Thomas] Freddy.

- And how did your son inspire you to start this?

- Well, you know, I found out, like I said before, that kids were not getting this hands-on learning, you know, in the classroom or outside the classroom.

There's 20 million kids on waiting lists to get into afterschool programs where they might learn STEM or STEAM.

And so I just thought, you know, I want my child to be able to tinker along with us.

And, you know, his dad started a Hackerspace and I have a Makerspace.

So it's just something that's been a part of his life.

And he's one of our best prototypers for all of our kits.

- And this is clearly things that kids are doing at home with their parents or their other siblings.

But you've also been able to introduce this to schools and in the classroom.

- That's right, yeah.

So some of our subscribers are also teachers.

And so they'll test some of these kits with their kids at home and decide what really works.

And then they'll ask for a large classroom kit that they can take and teach kids science and engineering in the class.

- This has to feel amazing to see this come to fruition.

What advice would you give to parents who are thinking about starting their own business and dreaming?

- Well first, you know, I really believe that do something that you're interested in, that maybe your family's interested in.

And test first before you wanna quit your job, you know, figure out if this is something that other people are interested in doing.

And there's a lot of ways that you can prototype and work in your community and your neighborhood to test your ideas out.

- [Darieth] Where does this go next?

- Next well, we're really hoping to expand internationally.

So we get a lot of requests from different countries to do that.

And we're really working with different co-designers now.

We have Nat Geographic Explorer that's working with us on a conservation kit that I mentioned.

We have a superhero kit coming up.

So just continuing the themes.

- That's great.

Well, it's such a creative idea and I can see where kids can really learn to play and tinker and explore and develop.

So thanks so much for being a part of the show.

- Thank you so much.

- How amazing is it when kids are the inspiration for great ideas and parents get to bring those ideas to life?

Parent entrepreneurs are contributing to a more inclusive, diverse and imaginative childhood.

So we hope that you'll introduce your children to more products made by parents.

And who knows, maybe you've even been inspired today to become a parent entrepreneur as well.

Thanks for being here and join us again next time for another episode of "IQ Smart Parent."

- [Announcer] Want to learn more about "IQ Smart Parent?"

Visit us online iqsmartparent.org.

For more episodes and additional tools and resources, connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest to share your thoughts on being a 21st century parent.

(quirky music) "IQ Smart Parent" is made possible in part by the McCune Foundation and the Grable Foundation.