Open AccessDesign and evaluation of a prototype of a children’s educational application during and for the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond
Author(s) -
Ingrid Teixeira Monteiro,
Edney L. de Q. Lourenço,
Marcelo Q. de Lima Brilhante,
Adriano Tavares de Freitas,
Francisco Oliveira,
Francisco Edivaldo Brito de Castro,
Ana C. B. De Oliveira
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
journal on interactive systems
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2763-7719
DOI - 10.5753/jis.2022.2004
Subject(s) - brainstorming , pandemic , covid-19 , session (web analytics) , process (computing) , mathematics education , psychology , computer science , medical education , sociology , world wide web , medicine , disease , pathology , artificial intelligence , infectious disease (medical specialty) , operating system
Covid-19 pandemic affected virtually every sector of life, due to the need to avoid agglomerations and maintaining social isolation. In education, teaching-learning processes have changed drastically and now are in a state of fast transformation. Schools all around the world were closed and teachers and students had to migrate to online environments. In this paper, we present a whole design process of conceiving an educational mobile application that explores the students' houses as a source of knowledge through gamification and augmented reality. Field studies such as online surveys and user diaries were employed and resulted into the creation of eleven personas representing teachers, parents, and students. After a brainstorming session and the definition of the basic requirements, a low-fidelity prototype was created and evaluated by ten students aged 6 to 11 years old from both public and private schools. The results of the evaluation pointed to the potential of the app in keeping children motivated and interested in learning while at home. We highlight the challenges and lessons learned in doing user research involving kids during a pandemic.