“Kids are curious, the world is fascinating, knowledge is power, and children really want to know what’s going on,” said Nelson, who hosts the fast-paced, six-minute show from her home in Singapore. “Children want the facts, but probably fewer details than you’d expect. We meet them where they are and keep it simple and straightforward.” The commercial-free show is non-partisan and avoids distressing topics like drugs and plane crashes.
Now in its seventh year, the nonprofit KidNuz has had more than 21 million downloads. It counts about 100,000 daily listeners, mostly children in classrooms. Teachers play it during homeroom, according to Nelson. “Our daily quiz is popular. Teachers tell us it improves listening comprehension because students listen carefully to get the right answers. That’s an unexpected, pleasant bonus,” said the Ridgefield, Conn., native.
“My Hamilton experience made me more confident and helped me realize I was capable of even more than I thought.”
A French literature major, she spent her junior year abroad at Sorbonne University in Paris. “My goal was to become fluent in a different language, and I did it,” Nelson said. “My Hamilton experience made me more confident and helped me realize I was capable of even more than I thought.”
Her journalist father inspired her career direction. Of her first job as news director at WREF-FM radio in Ridgefield, Conn., she recalls, “I loved being the first person to know something that happened and being able to tell people about it.” A career leap led her to San Francisco where she co-hosted the top-rated morning news show on KTVU-TV from 1996 to 2015. Along the way, she interviewed a 9/11 widow and luminaries who ranged from author Deepak Chopra and actress Angela Lansbury to supermodel Christie Brinkley and Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler.
One thing she doesn’t miss about daily TV news is getting up before dawn. “It was like getting ready for the hottest date of your life five mornings a week, and doing it at six in the morning was a bit tough,” she said.
Today she’s excited about the newest feature on KidNuz — Convo, a 20-minute interview on a single topic with scientists and government leaders. “It gets me back to my journalistic roots, digging into one subject, adding sound effects, and uploading episodes. It’s nice to learn new skills at this point in my life. It’s like I’m a one-woman band.”
Posted October 2, 2025
