Prototyping an APP: Gamification of parent — son relationship.
I have been taking a Coursera specialization of Human Interaction Design. For concluding the course and as a capstone, we needed to create a prototype of an app, using the techniques / background we learned on the specialization.
We had some general topics to use as a base for creating the APP, however, the first activity was to observe people in order to identify problems and possible solutions. This was the need-finding process.
When I started the capstone I wanted to work on a way to manage time, both professional and personal, that included my goals, traffic for commuting, making exercise, and other activities. However, when working on the need-finding process I didn’t found strong evidence (at least with the persons I interviewed) that I had a real need to work with.
That’s why I decided to use the Remix Project ( each week assignments were evaluated, and one was selected so we could work over others ideas) done by Zuzzette Foglio, who observed how parents communicated with their teens while there were away (https://s3.amazonaws.com/coursera-uploads/peer-review/vGGtBxVGEeW_mxLPrCkAqw/e93e690f2a82019189d1036668b48ab4/Capstone_Ideation_w3.pdf).
Of all the users needs identified by Zuzzette, I choose the following:
- Parent needs a way to know where their teen is without being intrusive or overly protective.
- Parent needs a way to get their teen to be more proactive about initiating contact or a conversation.
- Parents need a way for their teens to not ignore their calls or messages.
- Teen wants independence but also needs a way to let the parents know where they are.
- Teen needs a way to ask their parents for permissions in a way that minimizes rejections.
I have been professionally working on projects where part of the idea is turning an activity into a game, and this looked as something that can be turned into a game.
What’s the game about? Like most of the games, is about winning points in order to unlock prizes. How do you win points? By doing specific tasks related to be in touch with parents, like sending location, answering calls, sending SMS or calling. What kind of prizes do you unlock? Anything you can negotiate with your parents, like permission to go to the party, go camping, or maybe you want to change your smartphone, and that can be set as a prize.
As we learned on the specialization, it’s a good practice to start designing on paper. That way you can quickly prototype and iterate forward a more refined idea.
The first paper prototype helped me to identify the following constrains for the APP:
- As a game, the more important sections of the APP are showing the points and showing the prizes.
- We are working with teens and parents, two very different groups of people. So we need to keep it simple (for the parents), but not boring (for the teens).
- We need to be careful with pairing the information of the teens only with their parents (the whole idea behind, is giving some sense of security to the parents knowing that their teens, by using an app/game, are going to increase the communication — interaction with them.)
The first digital prototype was done with no colors. I wanted to test the idea and navigation. I found out that what is practical for me, isn’t clear or simple for others.
One example of this was with the “Back” button. In my mind it was clear that the user could use the “back” button from the Android OS, however, the users were confused on some screens, as they didn’t know where to click.
I also found that I tend to minimize the use of resources or even narrow the words or sentences, which is totally clear for me, but definitively not clear for the users. I had to make some changes to improve navigation and to comply with constrain #2 (making it easy for both parents and teens).
Finally I worked on the color and the logo. On the last week we test the application with random users, and I found out that navigation wasn’t still as clear as it should be, as people wouldn’t know where to click. The other comment I receive was that design was boring, so I start working on colors and icons.
Unfortunately I must admit I don’t believe the prototype is 100% polished. However, in my personal experience, the prototype is in good shape as a MVP (Minimum Value Product), maybe even more developed than it should be. I believe sometimes we lost a lot of time on details, when we first need to validate the idea and the possible business.
I invite whoever is interested on further development of the app, to leave a comment! (Here’s the link: https://invis.io/629B8GV7N)
