Impressions of the producer of Kodomo Challenge in Chinese | Feature 1: Kodomo Challenge for Chinese children

Top > Corporate Social Responsibility > Feature 1: Kodomo Challenge for Chinese children > Impressions of the producer of Kodomo Challenge in Chinese

Learning experiences for parents as well as children allow them to grow and develop as a family

I have a four-year old son of my own — an only child — and thus I think I can relate to the feelings that Chinese parents have when raising their kids. As parents, we are faced for the first time with the needs of a young child, and we are uncertain about how to fulfill our responsibility to nurture them. Kodomo Challenge is designed to reassure parents, and provide them with products and services that help ease these concerns.

Whether you live in China, or Japan, or anywhere else the first lessons a child must learn — how to feed itself, go to the toilet and develop basic social skills — are the same. But there are also minor differences, such as the type of food they eat, and so on. For a child to develop the appropriate habits and living skills, the content of lessons must be carefully tailored to the culture, and to issues such as local holidays or common daily activities. Our lessons are carefully edited and tailored to these local characteristics. We conduct countless interviews with parents, every month, to try to understand their needs and to clarify the purpose of lessons. For example, explaining to parents “what a child can learn, or what skills they develop by playing with this toy.”

Chinese parents are very concerned with the safety of toys, and also with having their children develop an early understanding of written characters and numerical concepts. On the other hand, it is my job to do more than just listen to parents. Kodomo Challenge is intended to not only teach children basic skills, but also to teach parents about child-rearing, and how to nurture their children effectively. I believe that this is one of its most important functions. I feel a heavy responsibility in knowing that the more products we distribute, the wider our influence becomes and the more we can contribute to the growth of young children.

Whether we are producing items for a single child, or for millions of children, our dedication is the same. Our local Chinese staff put their hearts into every month’s lesson, and we hope that their dedication can be transmitted to as many parents and children as possible.

Membership Enrollment Trend *Membership enrollment as of April

In China, consumers are becoming more concerned about product safety and reliability, especially when it comes to products for their children. Together with CWI Publishing House, the Benesse Group does its utmost to meet their expectations, by carefully selecting the manufacturers who produce toys for the Kodomo Challenge course. We not only inspect and carefully oversee each factory; we also make sure that the production partner fully understands our dedication to the concept of “living well,” and our expectations regarding product quality. We adopt the strictest standards of product safety of any of the four East Asian countries where we do business — Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan — then sets internal guidelines to ensure that all of our products surpass those strictest standards. Although the manufacturers we selected as suppliers had initial reservations about our stringent guidelines, the steady increase in enrollment for the Kodomo Challenge course and the high regard it has earned in China has become a source of pride, and they are encouraged to redouble their efforts to maintain product quality. This creates a benevolent cycle which benefits everyone.

Manufacturers emphasize product safety and reliability

Relevant Pages