This is current a work-in-progress
UI Challenges
These are a series of online Design Challenges that gives topics for users to work on. The theme for each individual days have been labelled accordingly
Celebrating Milestones:
Care for Parents with Atypical children
WORK IN PROGRESS
PROJECT TYPE
Service design, Interaction Design, UIUX Design
YEAR
2025
SCHOOL PROJECT
Caring for a child is always challenging, but for parents of atypical or disabled children, the responsibilities are even greater. They worry about their child's future the moment they are born, their ability to integrate into society, and what will happen when they are no longer around.
For this project, we are tasked with designing a care ecosystem that ensures these parents receive the support and assistance they deserve.
Together in a group of 6, we need to create an ecosystem design of care for parents with atypical children.
For my segment, I am focusing on the elderly stage of the parents, with their adult child with disability.
WHAT INSPIRED ME
The first thing that came in my mind is the concept of death and how parents would feel at the very last moment of their life. I want to explore both the joy and pain of parents at this moment of their life.
The news article below is the main inspiration to dive down in this topic.
In summary, parents often struggle with concerns about their child's well-being after their passing. Some set aside savings to ensure their child has a secure home, while others face emotional challenges that affect both the parents and their child's future. How can one design something to support these parents? What more can we contribute to improve these situations?
DOING INTERVIEWS AND RESEARCH
We decided to involve professionals in the field to give us more insights. We went to 3 different facilities that supports disability in different life stages.
Head of AWWA Home
and Day Activity Centre
Mdm See Lay Kim
The AWWA Home (AH) and AWWA Day Activity Centre (DAC) serve adults aged 18 to 55 with mild to severe physical and multiple disabilities.
Principal Trainer of
Rainbow Centre
Mr Tan Yeok Nguan
Rainbow Centre aims to empower people with disabilities to thrive in inclusive communities through early intervention, special education, and post-18 support.
Assistant Director for
Kindle Garden
Dr Shirley Soh
Kindle Garden is Singapore’s 1st Inclusive Preschool. Kindle Garden’s unique blend of pedagogy unlocks the potential of every child during their formative years.
FIELDWORK
We are invited to conduct interviews with the 3 facilities mentioned above. We have a good opportunity to understand how the system in these places worked and we managed to get an in-depth interviews with the professionals.
FINDINGS AND INSIGHTS
To conclude our findings, we separated the information into 3 different categories. So we could understand the current situation of different areas of society.
Do note that Kindle Garden isn't included since we interviewed them after our submission. I will include it once we are done concluding their findings.
UNDERSTANDING THE PARENTS
Based on research, interviews, and news articles, I have also identified four common emotional responses at the later stage of their life. Although there is a common worry through their life, but there is a slight difference when they are way older.
“I will put my everything to my child.”
Parent neglecting their own wellness for their child.
In terms of general health, caregivers appear to do worse than the general population.
“who can take care of my child like I could.”
Lack of trust in outsiders and protective of their child’s wellbeing.
Trust takes awhile to be built and often times the parents worries when they are not around looking after them or when the child is taken care by others.
“if really cannot, then go to home, no choice.”
Sometimes, (disability) homes are seen as a last resort and parents rather take care on their own.
However, when the parent(s) are unable to take care of them, the sudden admission to homes can cause trauma not only to the child, but also the parents
“what will happen to my child when I die?”
They fret over whether their child will have the necessary skill to integrate into society.
Worries about the child’s future and the potential effect it might have after they passed.
THE CARE GAP
As social designers, we have to understand the design that was created needs to have social values and care in mind. Using this model, my group has a general focus in our execution.
DESIGNING ECOSYSTEM AS A GROUP
Since we have to create a care ecosystem as a group, we have discussed and decided our ideas work like a life stage, so we want to tie our concept to "Celebrating Milestones".
Based on the diagram below, you can see that each of us created a different service touchpoint which is all stated inside the Early Planning - Visual Toolkit.
Individual Service Touchpoint:
COMPANIONCARE HOME
Oftentimes, elderly and disability are housed differently. Disability care and Elderly care may be different, but it has some similar features that can be equally utilised in the same facility. Can we connect that bridge and allow them to live together?
CompanionCare Home is a pair admission facilities home designed for aging parents caregivers and their adult children with disabilities. By supporting round-the-clock care for both elderly and disability care under one roof, it simplifies caregiving and allows families to live together in a supportive environment.
The creation of this facility is supposed to fill up the gap that is missing in Singapore's scene.
PART 2:
INTERACTION DESIGN
After creating the concept based on the research, we are also exploring different types of interaction designs of how our current concept can work with.
My idea for the app design is to create an internal app used within the facility for a fictional job called "Transition Family Facilitator".
"TRANSITION FAMILY FACILITATOR"?
Before I dive into the app design for this new job role created, we need to understand what is the role in this process.
Since my research indicated that sudden separation can cause trauma, I want the service of admission to follow the same. Sudden change in environment can be traumatised especially if it is not handled well. Hence, I want to introduce a smoother transition.
