Inspiration

We wanted to help parents who block YouTube protect their kids without cutting off educational videos. That tension became the starting point for Sprout.

What it does

Kids discover and request YouTube videos, and parents decide what they can watch. We removed autoplay, comments, and up-next recommendations to keep the experience focused on intentional viewing.

How we built it

We built a mobile-friendly web app with Next.js, React, Supabase, and the YouTube API, hosted on Vercel. We used Claude Design for prototyping and Claude Code to help build and iterate.

Challenges we ran into

Our biggest design challenge was giving parents control without making every video a chore. We kept approvals simple and left automatic AI approvals out of the prototype.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We tested with three kids ages 7–10 and three parents. Our pilot recorded a 9.6/10 average ease-of-use rating and completion times under 14 seconds. All three parents said they would use Sprout.

What we learned

Building for kids means designing for parents too. Ease of use matters on both sides: kids need a clear path to watching, and parents need a clear way to make decisions.

What's next for sprout

We want to test with more families, measure how independently kids complete tasks, and learn whether Sprout helps parents feel comfortable opening access to educational videos. Next, we plan to add Starter packs of pre approved videos based on parental preferences