Good Ideas from Preece, Rogers and Sharp

Graduate students were asked to discuss the first chapter, "What is Interaction Design?" in groups and to identify 2 - 3 key ideas.

1. Usability goals (behavioral) and user experience goals (reflective) are different.
2. Trying to achieve a usability goal may impact an experience goal -- there are trade-offs.
3. Good system design supports users in accomplishing tasks SAFELY -- mistakes are low-cost, are reversible, rather than costing you valuable data, processes, time.
4. Continuously divided attention -- an important design consideration (precious and limited cognitive resources).
5. Telephones are an emotional tool, but the appliance is not. How do we get people to fall in love with our product?
6. Design principles - like the do's and the don'ts, can follow them in the design process - makes a design more "error proof". Like, Visibility, feedback, constraints, mapping -- they all guide us.
7. Usability principles - lots of overlap, designers need to select which ones are most relevant to their particular design.
8. Mapping and fidelity - designers of simulations talk about levels of fidelity.
9. Transparency & consistency - so users encounter the same instructions, and can have the same expectations in different parts of the system.
10. Working together in multidisciplinary team - diversity can be a strength, and even an necessity, but it can take longer to develop a shared language and shared understanding of concepts - "what one person values, other people may not even see"

Pleasure and Learning (Norman, 2004)

In each of the design groups, graduate students discussed:

How might we attend to “physio-, socio-, psycho- and ideo- pleasure” in our designs for learning?

Physio-pleasure: sights, sounds, smells, taske, and touch
IDEA:

Social pleasure / interaction
IDEA:

Reactions and psychological state
IDEA:

Reflection on the experience
IDEA:

Unfortunately, I was unable to save the great ideas that emerged. Can anyone from class help by posting ideas in the comments section?

Snack List!

http://jabo.shawwebspace.ca/blog/

World Views: Three Levels of Design

In the context of the "big ideas to think with" in Vicente's Ch 4&5 and Norman's ch3, each group was asked to discuss how the (i) three levels of design, and the (ii) human-technology ladder, apply to their project.

1. The Pattern Heros - Guitar Hero & Patterning

• How can we make the best interactive game that teaches and engaging division 1 students in recognizing and producing a pattern?
  
• Graphics and sound extraordinaire!
  

2. 2Busy2Learn - Corporate training

• Defining our user using concept maps, adult learners
  

3. Holiday Engaged Learning - Family Treasure

• Children from diverse backgrounds who are learning English
• Increasing vocabulary
• May not speak English at home, or have tech support at home
  
• Holding humanistic and mechanistic aspects together
  

4. ESL Online Center - Global Language and Globalization

• Teachers building projects to help ESL students
• Listening, speaking, writing - basic levels, modular approach
• Blend of media (video, journals, audio)
  

5. The Cookie Jar - Distributed Students

• Creating a learning environment that supports students "wherever" they are
• Junior to senior high school learners
• Student focused Life management system
  

6. I3 - Inquiry for Teacher Learning Through Inquiry

• Bring teachers together to learn together about inquiry
• Engaging in an inquiry to design an inquiry focused program for teachers to learn through inquiry
• Viscerally appealing, collaborative, social cohesion, shared expertise
  

Krista: Playing with mathematics online

Thank you the chance to talk about my thesis research. I really appreciated your questions and discussion.

Someone asked about the mathematics problems - they are on the Galileo web site www.galileo.org click on the math link.

If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear from you. You can respond here or email me at kposcent@ucalgary.ca

Krista

Exploring Vicente and Norman's Views on Design

Graduate students were invited to discuss, albeit briefly, some initial impressions based on reading Kim Vicente and Don Norman's views on design and the relationship between humans and technology. Here are some ideas that emerged from the groups:

• There is / can be a disconnect between humans and designers (makers and users)
• Ikea is a great example of design that is both usable and beautiful
• Norman talked of the change from emphasis on the behavioral approach to design to the reflective realm
• Industrial design originally focused on usability with end-user in mind, now more of a focus on user-experience, emotion and includes end-user in design process
• A design needs to appeal on all three levels visceral, behavioral, reflective – and be connected to culture. We may need to change the emphasis on each level depending on the culture.

Graduate students in 679.02 are encouraged to add additional thoughts and comments to this discussion.

Examining 21st Century Learning

During Tuesday's seminar, graduate students chose one of two groups (Higher Education and K-12 public schooling) in order to discuss perspectives on 21st Century Learning (21CL):
1. What does 21CL mean to us?
2. What does 21CL look like?

What does 21CL mean in higher education?

• fear of change
• high paced learning
• high degree of specialization
• new set of skills
• out of the traditional classroom
• teach something students can relate to
• relation of class to every day life / skills
• tailor classes to relevant life / job skills
• information overload - need to be selective, better time and content managers

What does 21CL look like in higher education?

• high tech - load up the web pages, use books / media differently (digital, ebooks, pdfs)
• Choice of method / media to engage with information
• Increased collaboration
• student to student
• students to teacher
• teacher to students
• teachers and students to outside world (class, school, community country)
• Global culture
• Constructivist approach

What does 21CL mean in K-12 education?

• Teachers are more of a facilitator less of an instructor
• Changes in teacher practice
• Scary
• Immediacy
• Access to knowledge; to answers to student questions
• Constructing the environment with students
• Knowledge
• Culture
• Question: Is it necessary to have k-12 structure, as we know it?
  
• Assessment is required

What does 21CL look like in K-12 education?

• There can be a disconnect between teachers and learners
• Structures (ie school) may serve others
• There can be a disconnect between technology and curriculum
• New curriculum focused on problem solving, exploring individual meanings
• Blended learning

Graduate students in 679.02 are encouraged to add additional thoughts and comments to this discussion.