Press Release
Moodo Emotions App by Aishwarya Suresh and Jaylon Tellis Is Granted the A' Design Award in Interface, Interaction and User Experience Design
Aishwarya Suresh and Jaylon Tellis acknowledged for interface, interaction and user experience design by the international grand jury of the 2024 - 2025 A' Design Award & Competition
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
COMO, Italy, April 18, 2025 /DesignNewswire/ A' Design Award & Competition has confirmed the A' Design Award in the Interface, Interaction and User Experience Design category for Moodo Emotions App by Aishwarya Suresh and Jaylon Tellis, designed for Tinker Works. The result belongs to the 2024 - 2025 A' Design Award & Competition and was decided through blind peer review by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members, who scored anonymized entries against predetermined criteria.
What the A' Design Award Means
The Iron A' Design Award is awarded to good designs that meet the rigorous professional and industrial standards set by the A' Design Awards. This recognition is reserved for works that demonstrate a solid understanding of design principles and show creativity within their execution. Recipients of the Iron A' Design Award are acknowledged for their practical innovations and contributions to their respective fields, providing solutions that improve quality of life and foster positive change. These designs are a testament to the skill and dedication of their creators, showcasing their ability to address real-world challenges through thoughtful design.
Regarding Moodo Emotions App
Moodo is an engaging iPad app designed to help children recognize and express their emotions. Using an intuitive slider, kids can explore both basic emotions and their more nuanced layers. Guided by a friendly robot, they can identify their feelings and receive customized tips for managing them. By rethinking the traditional emotion wheel, Moodo makes emotional intelligence easy to understand, enjoyable, and accessible for young learners.
Award Record
This recognition makes Aishwarya Suresh and Jaylon Tellis a winner of 1 A' Design Award.
About the A' Interface, Interaction and User Experience Design Award
The A' Interface Design Award is an international design competition recognizing good user interface designs by the best UI/UX designers worldwide. It is organized within the A' Design Award & Competition and is open to interface designers, interaction designers, user experience designers and digital product designers from all countries. Typical entries include websites, mobile applications, software interfaces, game interfaces, wearable interfaces and virtual reality interfaces. The awarded interface designs are published at https://dezigners.org/design-category/interface
About A' Design Award & Competition
Organized annually since 2008, A' Design Award & Competition is an international, juried design accolade. The competition is open to entries from all countries. The philanthropic mission of the A' Design Award is to advance society through good design, by recognizing and promoting superior products, projects and services that benefit society, and by creating a global awareness and appreciation for good design practices and principles. Nominations are peer reviewed and evaluated anonymously by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members against predetermined criteria such as functionality, ergonomics, engineering, presentation, innovation, usability, sustainability and technology, with score normalization applied to remove biases. Awards are conferred at Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron levels. Eligible laureates receive the A' Design Prize, which includes the award trophy, the certificate of design excellence, the hardcover yearbook, a lifetime license to use the A' Design Award winner logo, exhibition of awarded works, an invitation to the gala night and award ceremony in Italy, inclusion in the World Design Rankings and Designer Rankings, and public relations and publicity services. Registration, uploading a work and receiving a preliminary score are free of charge, and Professional and Digital Edition laureates are not contractually obliged to pay further fees to claim the A' Design Prize. More information is available at https://competition.adesignaward.com
Press Resources
- Winner Page: https://dezigners.org/167658
- A' Design Award Page: https://competition.adesignaward.com/167658
- Media Showcase: https://www.designnewsroom.com/!167658
- Laureate Profile: https://dezigners.org/d/363450
- Further Information from the Laureate: https://bit.ly/4ghi2YL
Media Contact
Giulia Ferrari, Press Office
Designers.Org
Via Leone Leoni 32, 22100 Como, Italy
press@designers.org
+39 031 4491953
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Fact Sheet
The Work
- Project
- Moodo Emotions App
- Function
- Emotions App
- Category
- Interface, Interaction and User Experience Design
- Discipline
- Communication Design
- Industry
- Software
- Colors
- Black, Dark Slate Gray and Gray
- Images
- 5
- Client
- Tinker Works
The Recognition
- Laureate
- Aishwarya Suresh and Jaylon Tellis
- Country
- United States of America
- Recognition
- A' Design Award
- Edition
- 2024 - 2025
- Design ID
- #167658
Credits
- Team
- Aishwarya Suresh and Jaylon Tellis
- Image Credits
- Creator (UX Tech Lead) Jaylon Tellis, Moodo, 2025; Creator (UX Design Lead) Aishwarya Suresh, Moodo, 2025
Design Details
- Unique Properties
- Moodo is an innovative iPad app that helps kids understand and express their emotions in a fun, interactive way. Through a unique slider interface, children can easily explore core feelings and their subtle layers. With the guidance of a friendly robot character, they can pinpoint their emotions and receive personalized coping tips. Moodo reimagines the traditional emotion wheel, making emotional intelligence simple, engaging, and accessible for young minds.
- Inspiration
- Inspired by my five year old son, Moodo helps young children understand and express their emotions. At this age, kids often struggle with feelings like frustration or anger, leading to tantrums. While there are tools for parents to identify emotions in babies and toddlers, there is a gap in resources designed to teach preschoolers about emotional intelligence. Moodo aims to fill that gap, helping kids recognize, understand, and express their emotions in healthy ways.
- Research
- A literature review on emotional development in children was conducted, tracing the evolution of emotions from infancy to adolescence. Research by the American Academy of Pediatrics shows that emotional intelligence leads to more self-confident individuals. A usability study with children aged 5 to 8 provided insights that informed key adjustments, resulting in a simplified, child approved app designed to effectively engage young users while supporting their emotional development.
- Challenge
- Teaching young kids, especially about emotions which is a topic even adults struggle with, can be challenging. Our biggest challenge was taking a complex concept, traditionally shown in emotion wheel diagrams, and reimagining it in a way that is easy, engaging, and accessible for kids. Conducting usability studies and extracting meaningful insights was also an unexpected challenge as these young kids are just learning to express themselves.
- Realization and Technology
- We used the design thinking process to create a solution for children to develop emotional intelligence. This iterative approach helped refine designs in Figma, producing wireframes, high fidelity screens, and interactive prototypes for user testing. The app integrates an emotion database and a conversational AI engine (e.g., GPT models) to drive dynamic, context-aware dialogues, enabling real-time emotional recognition, adaptive responses, and personalized interactions based on user input.
- Operation and Interaction
- Moodo starts with a friendly robot who helps the child identify their emotion using a unique slider. The robot mirrors the emotion and engages in an interactive dialogue. The background changes to match the mood, and the child is guided to explore more nuanced emotions. They can describe the situation behind their feelings to the robot. A weekly recap helps the child track emotional growth and reflect on their increasing emotional intelligence over time.
- Project Duration and Location
- Project inception was in December 2024 in Houston and Los Angeles. Brainstorming, ideation, user research, usability study and design iterations virtually took place in January 2025.
- Specifications
- The app is for iPad and Android tablets which are commonly used devices by children
- Keywords
- emotions, emotion wheel, dynamic slider, child, kids, children, friendly, robot, novel interactions, user experience, user interface, emotional intelligence, emotional development, education, emotional wellness, AI, dynamic dialog, GPT model
