Synthesis

01.Results

Results of Concept Validation

Based on the results of our concept validation session with our interviewees, we gauged insights from our users as well as determined the most important areas of focus for our intelligent agent, KinderTab.

Synthesis: Bullying, Arguments, and Punishment

From the scenarios, we determined that the opportunity area related to disciplinary action such as bullying, arguments, and punishment is not an area that we can really address using the KinderTab because this area requires human contact instead of just an intelligent agent. For example, in cases of bullying or arguments, students only times want a hand on their shoulder and this is an emotional need that the KinderTab cannot meet. In addition, teachers always want to be present in cases of bullying or arguments because sometimes they want students to work out the problems on their own. Moreover, parents are concerned with an intelligent agent resolving the problem as opposed to teachers helping the students because parents always want the teachers to know of what is going on and be there. From these results, we gauged that the KinderTab does not really have a place in this area because human contact is required.

Synthesis: Student Work Progress, Working Aid, and Informing Parents

From the scenarios, we synthesized that we focused on an incorrect aspect of learning in the kindergarten classroom. Children at this age are just developing the cognitive skills that they will need for their future academic learning and performance and need to be guided along the right path of learning. Thus, at the kindergarten level, teachers are focused on more on the process of learning rather than the final result or outcome. This research enabled us to realize that teachers are more concerned with how a student arrive at an answer rather than if he/she has the right answer. Thus, in this respect, an intelligent agent that measures student work progress or serves as a working aid would not be very effective. Specifically, in the case of the working aid, in which our KinderTab would find misspelled words or incorrect grammar structure, teachers do not desire this functionality because they are more interested in students' exploratory learning and process of learning rather than if a word is misspelled. From our research, we determined our KinderTab would not be necessary in this area of the kindergarten classroom.

Synthesis: Lunch/Snack Schedules and Activities/Curriculum Archive, Monitors Student Interest

For this area of focus, we determined that teachers do not regard the KinderTab as being very useful. The reasons are because teachers like to personalize the activities and curriculum to fit the needs of their classroom, so they would not really use the recommendations provided by the KinderTab. Moreover, through the classroom activities that teachers currently use, they can already gauge the activities and areas that students find most interesting and intriguing. Thus, our KinderTab would not be very useful in this respect because teachers can already gauge student interest. For the lunch/snack schedules functionality, we found that teachers found it to be useful only in the respect that it could help set up and clean up for lunch/snack time. However, as a team, we determined that this functionality is not really in scope of what we are thinking for the KinderTab, so we will not have this feature in our final design.

Synthesis: Social

From the scenarios, we determined the opportunity areas with most need that can be facilitated by our KinderTab. A very important opportunity area that we synthesized from our research in addition to the functional tasks that teachers complete is that they also focus heavily on encouraging the social development and learning progress of their students. Because students in kindergarten are just taking the first steps towards developing the necessary social and cognitive skills in life, teachers find it very important to ensure that students are growing along the right path. They endeavor to foster development in students so that they can be prepared socially and academically for both elementary school and beyond. Thus, the KinderTab should facilitate social interactions between the teachers and students so that the former can help the latter develop and grow.

Specific instances of this were found when we presented the scenarios regarding circle time conversations, seating arrangements and groups, and the reward system. For circle time, teachers closely pay attention to what students are saying and aim to recognize when students lack in participation in order to encourage them to talk more and join in on the conversation. Thus, for each session, teachers record what is said and who said it and then reflects back on the conversation to think about how they can encourage more quiet or shy individuals to speak up in class. This is part of the social development process because teachers want to encourage students from an early age to join conversations and express their ideas and opinions. Thus, our KinderTab can help in this respect by recording circle time conversations and providing feedback to teachers on the frequency of students' contributions and what they say.

For seating arrangements and groups, we found that teachers like to put quiet students together in order to facilitate more social interaction and they like to change seating arrangements and groups on a regular basis for more students to get to know each other. Teachers also like to pair expert and struggling children together in groups so that the former can help the latter to learn and catch up. In addition, teachers want to know when students in a group are talking or not talking and help them talk more. Thus, the KinderTab should help in this respect by letting the teachers know which groups are more quiet than others. All of these techniques can help faciliate the social interactions between teachers and students so that teachers can help students develop necessary social interaction skills.

For the reward system, we initially concentrated on the teacher's functional task of rewarding students for performing well in class. However, we realized from our research that teachers like to reward students for doing something good for someone else to set an example for the class. Thus, this is again relating back to the social interaction of the classroom because teachers want students to learn to get along and develop social skills. This is why they do not only reward students based on performing well but focus more on rewarding students for helping others. This promotes the social interactions between students and other students.

Synthesis: Presence

In addition to social interaction, we found that this is another area of focus in which our KinderTab can greatly help teachers. We found that teachers believe in the importance of keeping attendance and tracking where their students are but find this task to be tedious and arduous as it takes their time away from concentrating on more important classroom activities and tasks. Thus, the teachers were greatly pleased with the idea of the KinderTab helping facilitate their efforts in this respect. More specifically, they liked the ideas of taking student attendance, organizing students to leave the classroom, tracking student belongings, and helping with field trips.

For taking student attendance, teachers believe that task is very tedious because they have to track every student who comes into the classroom, find and mark absences and keep track if a student has to leave early on a certain day. Thus, if KinderTab can help facilitate this task by recording attendance and keeping relevant information for the teacher, she can remove this task from her workload and focus on more important activities.

For organizing students to leave the classroom, the KinderTab can also help in this respect by tracking the physical location of each student so that the teacher has quick reference. Thus, if an emergency occurs or if everyone needs to leave the classroom for some reason, the teacher knows if she has every student with her and who she needs to find. Based on our research, we found that this is an area of opportunity for our intelligent agent.

For tracking student belongings, teachers and parents both really liked this feature because of its necessity and usefulness. Often times students bring clothes or items to school and lose them within a day or two, and it is difficult to look for lost items because teachers have too much other stuff on their plate. In addition, parents are unhappy to have spent money to buy something only to realize that their child lost the item at school. Thus, this is a great opportunity for KinderTab to help and facilitate. It can save teachers time and by keeping track of students' belongings, it helps teachers feel that they are doing their jobs and performing them well.

For field trips, we learned from our research that parents currently use email dlists or permission slips to contact parents. Thus, if the KinderTab could help facilitate these efforts, it would be helpful in saving them time. However, one point we realized is that field trips do not happen very often so parents would not have much of a need for this functionality and would only use it sparingly. Thus, in our evaluation of these research results, we determined that helping organize field trips would not be in the scope of our final design.

For emergencies and injuries, we found that these is not much need for KinderTab within this aspect of the classroom. The reason is that teachers always want to be notified first before an intelligent agent takes action, just because the health of the students is one of the top priorities so that always want to make sure that they are present if an injury or emergency arises. The minimal function that the KinderTab could fulfill in this aspect is to alert the teacher that there is an emergency or injury, but do only this and no more.