2. Observations

Person 1: Thermodynamics to COS 226 precept
Before lecture was ending, Person 1 (Joe) put their stuff away in their backpack and began to get ready to leave. The professor began to finish up lecture and everyone in the class packed, including Joe. Joe got up briskly, and left through the back exit of the lecture hall, as if he was in a rush. Joe was one of the first five people to leave. Joe then put his earphones in and listened to music (specifically, Avicii) on the way to his next precept. As Joe left the room, he had his large backpack over one shoulder (not both) and it seemed to be putting significant strain on his arm, because after a few seconds he put his arm through the other strap. He walked to the water fountain and took a quick sip of water and then entered the restroom. He entered and then entered a stall (I did not follow him into the stall…). After completing his business, he washed his hands, and checked himself out in the mirror, touching his hair briefly to fix his part. After drying his hands and leaving the restroom, Joe checked his phone again, to see if there were any notifications on his phone. He noticed a text message from his friend, and he then clicked on the message, replied, and sent the message all while walking toward the stairs to his next class. As he walked up the stairs, he stopped typing on his phone and just held his phone. After finishing his message, he skipped a track for his music to a different artist. He then walked over to his class, and peered inside the classroom before entering, to ensure that the previous precept was finished. He got inside, sat down on a desk in the middle of the rows, and set down his backpack on the ground next to him. He then pulled out his laptop, turned it on and opened up a browser to log in to Facebook. The rest of the period was spent with him looking on facebook until the preceptor began to call the class to attention, at which point he closed facebook and looked toward the front of the room.

Person 2: Religion to Organic Chemistry
Person 2 (Jane) was still attentively taking notes when the 10 minute period began, but this was because the professor went a little over time. As the professor wrapped up, Jane took her time putting her belongings in her bag, individually placing each pencil and item where it belonged. She then got up and walked over to the professor and asked a brief question regarding the assigned reading for the week. After the professor answered, she went back to her desk, put on her backpack, and walked out of the room with another student. The two students exchanged dialogue while walking, and they both seemed to laugh and enjoy each others’ company. The topic of conversation was regarding eating clubs, specifically the Terrace Offerings that recently took place. For the sake of privacy, the exact conversation is not transcribed here. While they conversed, they walked along a path to their next class. However, at a few times during the walk, they would falter in their direction because they would internally disagree on which path to take, so usually Jane would stop the direction she was going and go towards the other individual. A few times throughout the walk, either Jane or the person she was walking with would wave and say hello to an individual they knew, usually accompanied by a smile. As Jane walked to organic chemistry, she had difficulty opening the large door to Frick, so she just went through the door that her companion opened. She walked down the stairs and into the lecture hall, faltering before selecting a seat on the left side, near the front, and sitting next to her friend.

Person 3: Staying in the same class
Person 3 (Mark) does not have to switch classes when he waits for his 10-minute period. Therefore, when he finished with his class, he sat quietly and put his stuff away, and then took his materials out for his next class (a different notebook). He then waited and sat quietly, watching the preceptor finish answering instructions. As the preceptor left, Mark went on his mobile smartphone, and played a game of Temple Run 2. He continued to play until a few students entered the room for the next class, at which point he closed the application and then prepared some notes for his class – he dated the page, wrote the name of the course and the topic of discussion for the day. He then sat idly, waiting for precept to begin, while flipping his pen out of what seemed to be just boredom/apathy.

Overall Observations:

1. When students enter classroom before precept starts, they just sit there
2. Students who arrive late often struggle locating a seat during lecture, much to their embarrassment
3. Students carry around very heavy backpacks full of books and papers
4. Students walk around with laptops and computers
5. Professors usually arrive a few minutes early and set up their equipment
6. Students must sometimes cross crosswalks, etc. in order to make it to their class on time.
7. Between classes, students eat food, finish up problem sets, perform actions on their smartphone: messaging, facebook, email, etc, or speak with their friends who are also going to the same class as them. Sometimes try to get coffee or something
8. Students who are late run to class
9. Students often skip meals in order to get to their classes
10. Students often use the restroom before/after classes, or during this period
11. Students listen to music while walking
12. Students feel they waste time during this period

3. Brainstorm

1. Check for red lights at crosswalks, to determine how fast you need to walk to make the green light or not.
2. See lines at Starbucks, etc. on your phone to know whether or not it’s possible to stop by and get a drink.
3. ClassSeat: Have a seating visualization or a door visualization of the lecture halls so when people come late they can know where to immediately go to sit or enter.
4. Small mobile quiz after/before each lecture for students to review concepts
5. QuickSong: Automatically selects right amount of music to fill 10 minute gap
6. Sync bus schedule with classes so you can ride buses to next location
7. Alerts you to make sure you have all the right notes and textbooks for the class by tracking what is in your bag
8. Locates water fountains/bathrooms on your route if you are thirsty/need to go to the bathroom
9. Exercise between classes, select time and distance and it generates an activity for you to do while waiting.
10. Reads your notes to you through your headphones before your class begins or while you are walking
11. Sensors to improve posture while walking from class to class
12. Ball that vibrates when your friends are near, so you can find them to chat or just hang out and toss a ball around.
13. Flyer to Calendar: converts flyer events to google calendar events easily by taking a picture of a flyer so it uploads to your calendar
14. QuickLaundry: times your laundry with your classes schedule to determine the best place to do your laundry to fit into your schedule in 10minute intervals
15. Calculates speed at which you must run in order to get to your class on time
16. LateLecture: gives a live feed of first 5minutes of lecture as you’re walking over to your class if you’re late

4. Selection of Ideas

Motivation for Idea #1 – I selected the ClassSeat application, because I think it would be a useful application for many students for a variety of reasons (being late, wanting to sit near the front or the back of the class, etc) and would solve the issue of being late to class without disturbing the professor/students.

Motivation for Idea #2 – I selected the QuickSong application, because one of my students (Joe) mentioned to me that he had problems with always being in the middle of a good song while the class was starting, and I felt it would solve a small issue in a very easy and effective way.

5. Protoypes

ClassSeat:

In order from left to right, the screens would be as follows:

QuickSong:

 

Note: read this app from left to right, with the small tags underneath being the menu options that would appear for that given page.

6. Feedback

I tested the device on three individuals: Natalie, Vanessa, and John. Their overall input are as follows:

• Natalie

Natalie was at first confused by what to do with the application, she wasn’t really clear it was a phone application at all – however, this may be more due to improper set up than anything. Natalie then typed in her information, but did not know how to get to the next screen or hit “enter” which suggests that perhaps there should be a return key on the keyboard or a “go” button to click once the information has been put in. She also looked for a tab key of some sort, but was unable to find one. After getting to the main QuickSong page where the music was playing, she was unclear as to what to click, and she kept clicking the name of the song, hoping that it would do something (it didn’t).

Pictures of Natalie:

Natalie has some trouble finding the tab key as she types in her name:

Natalie changes the playlist successfully!

Natalie tries to click on the name of the song but it doesn’t do anything:

• Vanessa

Vanessa shared similar input as Natalie yet she offered a few more insights. Firstly, she complained that the thumbs up and thumbs down buttons only reordered the list and didn’t delete or add the options. This is important input which suggests that the thumbs icons could be changed to something more reasonable for reordering the playlist. She overall was perplexed by the playlist idea; how did one change the playlist? Where do the playlists come from? What if you want to get rid of a song from a playlist.Vanessa also was confused as to how the QuickSong app knew when her next class was, she did not quite understand that it synced to ICE; so perhaps clarification there would be even better.

• John

John’s major complaint was that he probably wouldn’t care enough to use / download this application. As John played around with it, he seemed to understand the interface pretty well, but again tried to click on the name of the song, which did not have any action. John, however, thought that he wouldn’t really use the application in his daily schedule. Overall, John’s actions were pretty accurate with how I wanted the app to be used.

Overall insights: make the app overall more clear, people in general did not really understand what was happening at each step of the process. Also make it clearer what can be clicked on and what can’t be clicked on. Furthermore, perhaps have a little introduction to the app for first time users, because people often did not understand or have any clue what this app was meant for or supposed to do. Small features like having the tab key or the return key are also crucial. One big change would be the use of thumbs up and thumbs down icons for the ordering of the playlist, because that was very confusing in retrospect and could introduce alot of issues with the application. The general idea of the application was more or less well received. Perhaps I could extend the usage of the application beyond the 10 minute period and just generate short playlists that would fill a specified amount of time (this might solve John’s problem with the application). Another important feature would be to explain to the users that the playlists are selected at random from “My Music,” which should be an album on the phone that was already pre-selected by the user. More customization of playlists and more features that can order playlists, etc. would most definitely be useful, as Vanessa suggested.