eileenolsen

[eileenolsen]

Adafruit CPX

Here me and @toranielsensollesnes played with led strips and made a fireplace. We used make code to change the lights, and we soldered the led strips with wires that we attached inside the box.

[eileenolsen]

Brief 9# Interaktive læringsmidler

Uke 50

DISKU

A group project with @annaelisfroiland​ & @Kari-Anne Olafsdottir

DISKU is an app that motivates group-discussion in the classroom with tools that strengthen students and teachers' roles.

Changes week 50!

This is the last week with our project, we will focus on fixing our prototype with the feedback we got last week. This week was intense but also structured and fast, it consisted mainly of cleaning our prototype on what's important and necessary to have, and narrowing down frames on how to navigate around the app. We removed the log in frames, alot of side information and put the different roles rules on the role site instead of the waiting lobby for the group. We also added icons for the different roles to make it easier to find and remember. 

To make it easier for the teacher to have more control on the progress for the groups , we added a “timer” that would gradually fill the “group icon” and then the “group bar” on the teacher mode site. When the students are done, they will get a screen that shows that they're done. We didn't have a user test this week, due to lack of time on both hands. We added more “art” in the app, and icons to spice up the layout.

A short recap on what rules our app is based on. DISKU follows “Fagfornyelsen 2020” and IGP-Individ-gruppe-plenum ( Individual-group- plenum). With many user tests on teachers and students we have found out that group discussion and IGP is the best method to teach.

[eileenolsen]

Brief 9# Interaktive læringsmidler

Uke 4

Week 4 of 5 is done , after feedback from last week we wanted to focus on fixing our prototype , changing the layout, the font, colors and changing some of the roles. We asked our users on what kind of layout, font, and colours they found “attractive” and why. We showed them some examples and this is what we decided to go for. We chose colours that are soft but also give contrast to each other, with simple icons and softer edges on the boxes. We made a completely new prototype and added the necessary information and frames from the last prototype, and made it cleaner. One of the main reasons that makes the students more reflective and learn as much as possible , comes from how the teacher teaches them. So we want to include the teacher more in the students teaching by making a “teachermode”. This allows the teacher to make groups, choose questions and decide the time limit for each group/student. We also wanted to test out group discussion, how they talked, thinked and interacted with each other. So we wanted to give the group 1 minute each to speak, have a group discussion and then let them write a short “summary” at the end. We tested this with our users by pretending to be teachers and giving them 1 minute each to talk and answer questions, and then write key words/sentences .

The users liked our new layout, it was clean and they understood how to navigate on the app, they liked the colours, but would like some more icons and variety of color on the different “people”. They also wanted the app to have a filter that would filter out bad words. After the user test we decided to make some changes. We also gave our app a name : DISKU!

Our changes: 

We changed the role “Ordstyrer” to “Oppleser”.

Instead of having a collective timeframe, the “Tidtaker'' decides when the time is over and who's up next to talk.

The tidtaker role has a timer on his site, and decides when the next person is talking.

On friday we showed our prototype to our teachers,we got feedback on how we presented the prototype. They told us that we had a lot of setup on the app, clicking and writing, that they didn't really understand what our concept was, We had to be more precise on how the app works, what it's about and why. We had to clean our app more, get rid of unnecessary frames and information. We also had to test out the timeframe of our group more, we had a good start but they wanted us to test more. When it comes to the different settings in the app, we had to minimize it, and give the teacher an already made setup and make it easier for the teacher to do their job. This is going to be our focus next week!

[eileenolsen]

Brief 9# Interaktive læringsmidler uke 48!

For this week we focused on making our concept into a prototype on Figma. We started with making a “timeline” on how the homepage would look to how the app works. Then we added the main functions , “teachermode and studentmode”, these modes makes it possible for the student and teacher to get their own version of the app. Teacher mode lets the teacher decide which theme, type of groups and questions that the students will get. While the student mode makes it possible for the students to get their own role, discuss the questions that the teacher is giving, and share their own perspective and opinions.

They start by entering their username & Password , and then the gamepin. The teacher can choose between groups of 2 & 2 or 4 & 4, in groups of 2 & 2 the students are free to discuss however they like, if the teacher chooses 4 & 4 the students get their own role. Each role gives the student a guideline on how to keep the discussion going, like “the Motivator”. As the motivator you have a responsibility to keep the group motivated and focused. Come up with suggestions and opinions to keep the discussion going.” or “The Specialis, as the specialist you can search in current and relevant sources to support a discussion/argument. We currently have 6 roles, with different tasks. It’s important to us that the roles the students are getting won't affect their argumentations, but rather give the students a path/direction they can follow, and motivate them to discuss more. We also tested our prototype on 4 students, where we got positive and negative feedback. They understood the concept rather quickly, they liked the idea that the app stores and saves their answer/feedback, they also liked how the roles made it more organised , “ We don’t have to talk in eachothers mouth, everyone gets a saying in the discussion”. What we have to focus more on is how to make the roles more specific, like “The  Chairman”, his task is to make sure every member of the group gets the word, but can he come up with opinions? and when does he have the word?. We also have to make more roles, and test the app in different situations. Our problem statement now is “ How can an app strengthen students to make an ethically and reflected choice tied to social media?”

When we had the presentation for our teachers , they liked our problem statement, “ It was easy to understand, and pushes the students to discuss.” But we got critique on how the app would work irl, “How does the students talk, and write, how can it be used and interpreted? ” We have to test the app more, and think about what's an answer and what's not. If there’s a question about personal experience, then there's no correct answer. It would be wrong to have an scripted answer. This will be our focus for next week.

[eileenolsen]

Brief 9# Interaktive læringsmidler uke 47!

After the feedback from week 46 we needed some guidance and help on which direction we should go with our project. We put up a meeting with one of our teachers which recommended that we had to step down a notch, and take look back at our research and findings. He told us to focus more on “How to make it easier, for us and the user.” This made us rethink our decision on how mental health is connected with sex ed, instead we started to research and look on what the youth uses their time on and whats important to them. 

We noticed that social media has a huge impact on their daily life. So the direction started to point on how social media impacts mental health and identity. 

Social media makes it easier for students to get in touch and be connected, especially during this pandemic. 

With our new direction we started to do research on different social media platforms, what platforms the students uses, how often its used, whats negative/positive with social media etc. To get a deeper understanding we hade user test, where we asked questions to the students.The feedback we got was fun and interesting.Tik Tok, Snapchat and Instagram were the most populare social media platforms. Because its easy to use, and everyone has it. Many were neutral about how getting “likes” and “hearts” affected their confidence. Some would delete their post if they didnt get enough likes, while others just didnt care, “ They’re propably jealous of me, and thats why im not getting likes.” Even though social media can be fun and good for you, the ugly side of social media can be scary. Stories about cyber bullying , blackmailing and harassment, by either sending ugly text messages, spreading a picture or just making “hate groups” were common. This was something we wanted to focus on, how to make students more aware of their actions on social media. With new information, motivation and many zoom meetings we came up with our new problem statement:  How can an application as a teaching aid empower young people to make ethically reflected choices related to social media?

[eileenolsen]

Brief 9# Interaktive læringsmidler uke 46!

We’re starting on our final assignment which will last for five weeks, from week 46-50. This brief is a cooprative task with Aschehoug forlag, the largest book publisher in Norway.

In a group of 3 we have to design a interactive learning aids for students in primary or secondary school.  The result will be a interactive prototype with the aum of increasing learning outcomes through good experience.  

For the first week we did alot of research on the excisting curriculum objectives on different schools, and tried to find out if there was something interesting to work with. Many of the different competence goals within the different subject were similar or had similar traits. For example, the subject of mental health in social studies is linked til social media. While in religion its about ethnicity, and affiliation. We wanted to focus on how mental health is linked to sexuall education. We did alot of research and decided to focus on 7th grade, even though 8th grade is the most comon place to start sex-ed. The reason why, is that sex-ed focuses mostly on how to put on a condom, sexual diseases and pregnancies, but not about emotions, feelings, and identity. Like what preferences each person has, their gender, identity and consent. We wanted to make the students avare and that its okei to talk about emotions and personal things. 

Throughout the week we did alot of research, had alot of zoom meetings discussing and coming up with arguments on what interactive aid will work best. We used Miro and trello to set up our week, and handed out tasks to each group member. 

[eileenolsen]

I made a cat pet another cat by pressing the a and b button!

[eileenolsen]

Movement Wednesday!

[eileenolsen]

On wednesday we played with movement! Adafruit Circuit playground!

[eileenolsen]

Adafruit Circuit Playground!

This week we started with Adafruit and got a task for each day to finish. On tuesday we got to play with lights , and I made a thundercloud. We used MakeCode to code the lights.

[eileenolsen]

API

For this week we had to make content by using data from a website in HTML and CSS. We chose Bysykkel Oslo, and we wanted to find out if the population in Oslo traveled longer on city bike under corona than before corona. We used historical data from Oslo CityBike website to compare the distance.

We made a graph that showed the average distance in a week per person from 2019 to 2020. The graph shows an increase of distance by 30% from week 36 2020, and 28% in week 37. This website will update every week and is available by the bustop, bicycle stop to encourage people to travel by bike during this pandemic.

[eileenolsen]

This week we had a quick project on how to use HTML and CSS in Atom. Our theme was bicycle , and i wanted to make a "bicycle poem therapy". Click on the button "Mer dikt" to get a poem and go for a ride to "mind blown-ness".

[eileenolsen]

FMM TeamUp

This version makes it possible for the player to team up with another player to do quests and co-sign artists!

https://www.figma.com/proto/cBagrJBbSUBpPaBMvbiJrD/FMM-v.3?node-id=118%3A0&scaling=scale-down

[eileenolsen]

FMM TeamUp

Figma project

The FMM app lets their users make a lineup from artists and bands playing at festivals to compete against other managers earning them points based on their gig review.

When we tried the FMM app it lacked the social aspect, and became repetitive, and even though it was an online game, the user felt offline. It also lacked content and rewards to keep the user motivated to use the app daily. Our goal for FMM TeamUp was to make the app more social, more fun to play and to make the user more motivated to use it. The solution was to make it possible for the player to team up with another player and do quests and sign different artists.

[eileenolsen]

A video demonstration from the Mario Band project! Using the cymbal makes Mario jump! :D

[eileenolsen]

FMM

App prototype

In the last post I showed my paper prototype on how I wanted it to look and work. I got some feedback during my progress and focused on how to make it interesting and understandable. The feedback i got for this Figma protoype was that there was alot of text and I had to make it shorter, efficient and informative.

The idea behind it was understandable by making sure the user got on board, and understood the mechanics. The game mechanics I had in the game was positive , and fun! I only had to take a few steps back, on how far my "Tour" can reach , is it World wide or only in Norway? I'll make sure take these feedbacks and work on it.

[eileenolsen]

App development

FMM

For these 3 weeks we are tasked to work with improving a part of an app. I decided to work with the reward system , by making it easier for the player to gain more points and use the app daily. Here Ive sketched how I want it to look, how it works and why! There were some things that didnt work and that I could improve! I got some feedback that i had to make sure that the user understood every new mechanic, so they didnt feel stuckor confused.