Gurugram: Concerned about the excessive use of mobile phones among children, a woman from Haryana's Gurugram has set up an online portal in a bid to develop children's interest towards news reading instead of wasting their time merely scrolling on social media platforms. Children these days spend most of their time glued to smartphones doing nothing.
While being addicted to the phones, the children are cut off from the worldly knowledge even as they also lack understanding of general knowledge. Nidhi Arora from Gurugram felt the same thing about her son and decided to change the behavior of children and increase their interest in the news. Over time, she converted her idea into an online platform which caters to many topics like news, memory games, quiz and others to increase the interest of children.
Her news portal is not only popular in India, but attracts children from all over the world. Hailing from Gurugram, Nidhi completed her B.Com from St. Francis College, Hyderabad. She studied Master's in IIM, Kolkata and worked in leading corporate organizations for several years. Nidhi said that in 2015, she wanted to take a break from her career and spend time with her son.
She said she resigned and took full responsibility as a housewife and a mother. It has been Nidhi's habit since childhood to read newspapers when she wakes up in the morning. Continuing this habit, she wanted to pass the newspaper reading habit to her son. But as her son was not interested in this and she wanted to change his habit.
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“In this order, I searched for newspapers that provide news to make children interested, but with no result, my son was not interested in it,” Nidhi said. “However, I wanted to change his behavior. While thinking like this, I got the idea of creating a news magazine specially for children and share this in our Facebook community. As many mothers liked this idea, in 2017 we started a newspaper named 'The Children's Post of India,''said Nidhi.
While taking ideas from other mothers in the community, Nidhi has started providing interesting news to the children through the platform. Nishi said she has been running an audio library for the past 22 years. “But children learn more by reading than by listening. That is why we want to encourage children to read.
With this in mind, no podcasts have been prepared for my son either. We plan to provide 50 percent of our newspaper with national and international news, and general knowledge, and the other 50 percent with puzzles and memory games,” she said. She said they gradually made the children interested in the news.
“Many children have started showing interest in reading our newspaper. But keeping in mind the development of technology, we have transformed this newspaper into a website. Currently, we are providing News, Current Affairs, General Knowledge, Puzzles, Quizzes, Memory Games, Grammar, Jokes, Posts, etc. for kids on our website. Through these, the children's awareness of the things happening around them will increase and their concentration and IQ levels will also increase as they show interest in brain-sharpening games and quizzes,” said Nidhi.
Nidhi said that they have a special team of experts working to provide news along with puzzles, cartoons, poems, etc. “Wherever elections are held across the country, stories are provided in a simple form so that children can have a comprehensive understanding of them. Also, Super Mom is explaining all the festivals to the children through her news portal,” she said.
