Testimonials > Hogeschool van Amsterdam
Hogeschool van Amsterdam high school is the largest in the Netherlands. Thanks to the expertise of Lesterius and a simple iPad, its possible for the department of motor skills, sport and diet to measure the motor skills in children aged from 6 to 12 years old.
Huub Toussaint, Hogeschool van Amsterdam
« Our university is the largest institute of higher education in the Netherlands. We are based in the Faculty of Sports and Nutrition. And we are part of the Physical Education training academy, which trains PE teachers. The main task of a PE teacher is to teach children to use their bodies better. And so we really wanted to know what effect these teachers have on children with the physical education they give them. We were really interested in mapping the children’s physical skills in the gym by measuring them.
That gave us the idea of using an iPad to measure motor skills in children aged between six and twelve years old. We got to work with Bart and things clicked right from the start. We got on really well with him. We had a first version of our application in next to no time. And we were definitely satisfied with it. But, well, once you have a first version, you see its potential. So we ended up with a certain amount of ‘feature creep’, wanting more and more from the software. »
Peter Bouma, Lesterius
« The project has evolved somewhat. It was reasonably simple in the beginning. There was little differentiation in the questionnaires. But that has changed over time. »
Antoine de Schipper, Hogeschool van Amsterdam
« The user interface and user experience are actually key components in the product’s success. We know that gym teachers need to trust the product and rely on it to work quickly and efficiently. Actually they need the feeling that ‘it was no trouble at all’. And one of the important starting points we have always stuck to is: what you see is what you need to fill in. You give a score for everything you see. And you let the computer work out the rest. »
Peter Bouma, Lesterius
« It needs to work flexibly, provide a clear overview and be very easy to use. And although the database behind the scenes is pretty complicated, the front, I mean the part you see, has to seem as simple as possible. And that is a challenge. »
Huub Toussaint, Hogeschool van Amsterdam
« Bart had a lot of freedom to do what he wanted, certainly in the beginning. And we were delighted to see how he shaped the project. He always had a suggestion, asking what we thought of this or that design. And that way, and also by continually getting people on the ground to take the tests with FileMaker software, it meant we had a fairly rapid feedback loop on things like how can you design and implement that. So that is exactly how it worked to start with, and it worked pretty well actually, to our satisfaction. »
Peter Bouma, Lesterius
« Obviously there was a lot of knowledge at Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences about how to approach this kind of research, and even some knowledge of the technical approach. But the skills to build an iPad solution were completely lacking. And if you ask me, that was something we were really able to help with. »
Antoine de Schipper, Hogeschool van Amsterdam
« In fact I really enjoyed working with Lesterius. I realised that my own knowledge — I have some programming skills of my own — only went so far. And they could really complement that with their knowledge of databases, especially FileMaker. We see that teachers are increasingly open to research. And one reason for that, of course, is that the barriers preventing them from joining in, participating, are coming down. And, above all, they see that the data generated is really useful for them as well. So they can collect really useful data without much effort. And that is actually what the whole project is about. »
