Exercise 3 - Main persona

Marie

Name: Marie Andersson

Age: 39

Hometown: Upplands-Väsby, Sweden

Background
Marie is a 39 year old high school teacher of history and social studies. She is originally from Västerås, but at the age of 19 she moved to Stockholm to study at Stockholms University. In her last year she met Niklas, a law student at the same school. After a few years together they got married and decided to move to the suburb, Upplands Väsby. There they are raising their two kids, Erik and Linnea, 9 years old and 7 years old. In their vacations they usually go to their cabin in Dalarna.

Personality
Marie is outgoing, helpful and involved in her family and friends. She is usually very calm, but has a busy schedule and is therefore not always patient. She is very tidy, which she demands from her children to be as well. Her childrens’ well being and education is very important to her, and she likes to activate them, for example with museums and sports.

Today

Marie has been working at the same school for many years and is happy with that. She recently became a Friskis & Svettis leader. Todays she is tired from a long week at work preparing exams.

Scenario 1

Marie and Niklas had been planning their Tom Tits visit for a couple of days. They both knew they wanted to go there after seeing an ad in the local news paper. Marie had been there once before when she was young, but for the rest of the family this was the first time visiting the museum. Therefore, she is slightly more excited so she visited the webpage in advance. When visiting the web page she saw there would be a soap bubble show, that she thought especially Linnea would appreciate. They also found information regarding prices and opening hours there. She is hoping that this museum visit will take her thoughts off all the stress she has been experiencing at work the last couple of weeks.

When they arrived at Tom Tits she saw signs about the new “Tom Tits Exp” app but she didn’t have an internet connection and the museum didn’t have Wi-Fi. Niklas downloaded it on his phone and she decided to have a look with him. She borrowed his phone and oriented around quickly on the app to get an idea of what it was about. She saw general information, maps and experiment explanations and thought this could come in handy during her visit. Then she focused her attention on her family. Her children was eager to start experimenting and Marie and Niklas were just as excited and did a lot of experiments together with the children. They noticed that there wasn’t a lot of staff, which made it impossible to do one of the experiments. Marie found it sometimes hard to explain to her kids. She realized she needed the app to get the most out of the visit and borrowed Niklas phone frequently. She noticed that she was almost alone using it at Tom Tits though.

At lunchtime they stopped by the cafeteria, which was quite expensive, but they just got their pay check so it was all right. They appreciated the food being ecologic and organic, and explained why that was beneficial to their children.

They ended the museum visit by taking the slide down. Erik nagged about doing it another time but they had to go back to the car since they hadn’t paid a ticket for a longer stay.

After the visit, both Marie and Niklas recommended the museum to colleagues at work and said it was a good place to take the family.

Scenario 2:

Holiday season starts and Marie and her family are planning to go hiking at Tyresta National Park for the weekend. Just when they are about to leave, it starts to rain. Thus they decide to go to TomTits, since a colleague had recommended it to Marie. Her husband is disappointed, because he was looking forward to being outside in the nature. But since they didn’t come up with any other idea they decide to go. This was an impulsive decision so they didn’t have time to look up the museum before the visit.

When they arrive Marie sees all the kids running around and with slightly panic in her eyes she asks at the desk for some information pamphlet but they are just offering a simple map. The staff refers to the app or proposes buying the book. But Marie's internet volume is already consumed for this month and she is not willing to pay for a book in addition to the entrance fee.

She accompanies her children to the experiments. After a while they reach a complicated water experiment which fascinates her children. It is a construction, where half of the injector are pointing from inside to outside and the others reversed. Marie don’t know nor the explanation on her own neither how to explain this phenomenon. The experiment is missing an information sign. She asks a stranger who is using the app about the description to the experiment and gets disappointed as she realizes that the brief explanation not satisfies her own need for explanation. Therefore she finds herself not able to explain it to her kids.

When she goes back to her kids, they have already vanished. She finds them running around on another floor. Everything attracts their attention, but only for split seconds. She experiences troubles to motivate her kids to observe intended phenomenon.

On her way out she passes a  TV screen which advertises a bubble show. She just wants to motivate her children to watch it as she is realizing it has already taken place. So Marie and her family decides to leave the museum and go back home.

Group interview summary

In the interviews we found out that the information about the experiments on Tom Tits didn’t reach the visitors. Next to (most of the) experiments is a short text, but to find more information you have to connect to the mobile application that almost no one knew about. The people who knew about it thought it was too unavailable to use anyway. Furthermore neither the app nor the short text was available in another language than Swedish. Some of the visitors could see a problem with relying on visitors having smart Phones and encourage the idea of having some devices at the museum instead.

Almost everyone we talked to visited Tom Tits because it combines an educative and fun environment for both adults and children. But also almost everyone felt that the information regarding the experiments was hard to reach, which made it hard to explain in a scientific way to the children. We realized that the ages of the kids coming to Tom Tits varied a lot, so it would be great to be able in some way to reach all different ages. In one of our interviews, a visitor suggested different difficulty in the information texts for both young kids, adults and “nerds”. In that way everyone can learn something, whatever age you are and how interested you are in the subject. Another important issue is to catch the attention of the children and to motivate them to look out for the observable phenomenons, which can reached by asking for details.

We all got the impression that it was really hard to get the answers we wanted without leading them in a direction.

After our interviews some of us came to the conclusion that parents have a positive view on the idea of implementing technology to the museum which is a good thing for us.

Interview Tom Tits 20 sept 2014

Interview Tom Tits 20 sept 2014 afternoon top floor (experiments of the human body)

Intervjuade: Mamma och Pappa till 2årig son samt ett spädbarn

START

Q: Är det första gången ni är på Tom Tits?

F: Ja jag tror det. Kommer inte ihåg om jag har varit här när jag varit liten?

Q: vad vill ni få ut av vistelsen?

F: få bort så mycket energi som möjligt

Q: har ni använt någon teknik? Det finns en app Det finns lite reklam här och där.

F: Nej inte hunnit med

Q: Finns det teknik som skulle kunna vara till fördel

F: Ja det tror jag. Ja sen när man kommer med äldre barn kanske. Det är lite svårt med en två åring som tycker något är roligt för en halv sekund och sen springer han till nästa grej.

Q: Ja då kommer vi från en teknisk utbildning.

F: men då skall ni prata med min man istället han har varit här flera gånger.

Q: Vi Gör ett arbete som handlar om det skulle kunna finnas någon teknik som skulle kunna underlätta under besöket. Som vi har varit inne på ja det finns en app. Har du sett att det finns en app? Med information om experimenten och så.

M: Vadå för Tom Tits eller? Nej jag har inte sett det.

Q: hur kan man få ut informationen?

F: gör det lite tidigare vid ingången. Inte när man kommer in för då ser man inte var ungarna tar vägen.

Q: Man vill ju kanske kunna förklara för sina barn vad som händer med mer kött på benen.

F: Ja speciellt med de där vätskorna och sånt där Där skulle man ju vilja ha lite mer om hur det fungerar och så.

M: det är du som använder det där med appar (till kvinnan)

Q: Vad skulle du vilja ha för att lära dig och få mer kött på benen? Kanske någon liten skärm?

M: Något sånt, jag läser ju de små lapparna som finns bredvid. Det spelar ingen roll för mig.

K: men det finns ju inte så många lappar.

Q: Ja det finns ju inte så mycket information i lokalen och inte så mycket personal.

K: vi tänkte på den där spaceball. Där det står det fråga personalen. Och där står man och då borde det finnas någon personal här uppe iallafall eller ska man åka ner till ettan och receptionen?

Q: Det är sjukt roliga experiment. Och alla föräldrar är lika aktiva som barnen.

K: Ja, verkligen Vi sa det att om 4-5 år kanske vi åker tillbaka hit

Q: då kanske vi har den där tekniska lösningen som är lite mer.

K: Ja då behöver vi inte vara med. Då har de säkert sina egna Iphones och gå runt med säkert.

Q: det var en som tycket att det var en bra blandning han hade en femårig dotter som tyckte om såpbubblorna och han tyckte om illusionerna. Det finns något för alla.

K: Ja verkligen det är det som är kul här. Av det lilla jag hinner se.

Q: barnen kan springa runt fritt det. Man har bra överblick iallafall och det är lugnt

K: Jag tycker de borde ha en bebis avdelning. För det är ändå 0-2 år som går in gratis. En förälder i barnhörnan. Det behövs inte så mycket. Han (2 åringen) tyckte de där uppe som man sätter ihop var intressant för honom.

Q: Det finns något för alla.

Q: Tack då har vi fått lite generell feedback.

SLUT

Short summary

During my interview I got told that the parents thought it was hard to use any kind of personal device to get information because they had to keep track of their children. To get information about the experiments they used the short texts that were beside them, but they said that they missed short texts at many experiments. Furthermore they said that they wanted to be involved in the experiments with their kids and that they wanted to be able to explain to them. They also told me that Tom Tits had something for everyone! Finally they had not used the app and even if they have had the time they wanted to get the information about the app earlier preferably before their visit.

Exercise 2 - Lisa Torekull

Interview Tom Tits 20 sept 2014 

The first interview I had was with a man I his 40:s and his two girls at the age of 8-12. Before we started recording we explained the purpose and what we would use it for. He was fine with it and we started the interview.

Är det er första gång som ni är här på Tom Tits?

Det är vår andra gång.

Aha okej, varför kommer ni hit? Var är det som lockar?

Jaaa.. ja det känns vettigare än bus-och lekland till exempel.  Det är väl, det känns lite mer lärorikt tänkte jag.

Så det finns ändå som en baktanke med att det ska lära sig något, att få med sig något eller att få med sig något intresse?

Jaa något intresse framförallt, så att de blir lite nyfiken på saker. Jag tror inte att det är så att man man ska förse dem med massa kunskap.

Okej, är det någonting som du har kännt nu när ni gått omkring här att det är något som du hade velat kunna förklara men som du kanske inte har kunnat för att det inte har funnits information, eller om dina barn har frågat om som du inte riktigt visste hur du skulle förklara riktigt?

Dom grejerna som jag inte kan förklara är dom grejerna som jag inte fattar själv alltså där är meningen är hur det ska gå till. Förstår jag så mycket brukar jag kunna förklara vad som händer själv.

Har du använt Tom Tits egna app någonting som finns här?

Nej alltså.. (plockar fram en mobiltelefon, icke smart Phone) det fungerar inte.

Haha jaa då blir det ju svårt, men det är ju bra då får vi in den målgruppen också. Dom har en app här istället för att ha så många skyltar, hur känner du för sånt?

Skulle du hellre ha det på plats?

Jaa alltså lite mer information om en del av dem där grejerna.

Jaa det jag tror att det var allt, tack så mycket för att du ville vara med.

Summarize of interview:

I did two more interviews but this one especially gave a lot of good material for our project. He explained that he actually had though about why he went there with his kids.  This visit would actually give his children something rather just going to a “play house”.  And it was the same for the others I interviewed; even though it wasn’t the knowledge itself that was the most important the experience might start an interest. To challenge kids minds and make them think a bit further. 

When I asked about if they had any difficulties explaining the experiments at a kids level most of them had no problem as long as they understood it themselves. But they all agreed on that Tom Tits could be better at giving information. None of them I had used the app. One had tried but it didn’t contain just the one experiment he had questions about and one, even though he knew about it, didn’t download it. And as it says in the interview, one didn’t have a smart Phone.

As a conclusion of my interviews they all agreed on that it was important for the kids to get inspired from the visit and it should be easier too get information and explanations for all. Not only the ones with smart phones.

State-of –the- art analysis – website

I did an analysis on To Tit´s website. The website contains almost everything about Tom Tits. Where you can eat, where you can park your car and so on. But the most relevant part of the website for our project it’s a very good one where you can read about the experiments on the different floors.  So that when you go there know what to expect before you go there. It doesn’t show all the experiments but most of them and they have a short text attached that tell the most important part of it.

But I think its very good of them to show what they offer so that parents and other people with children can get an idea of what to expect and see if it is something for them.

So this website is more for those who think one step ahead or haven’t bin there before.

Tom Tits website aims for tourist, or first-time visitors and on that note the website works very well. But for those who I interviewed this website was not relevant to use for other than to see what time it opens and other basic info.   

During our study we focused on when you are already there and how to get information and explanations. So I tried to visit the website throw my phone, and I am sorry to say that it weren’t as good then. It didn’t adapt to my screen so it was hard to reed and navigate. So if I wanted to know something about an experiment I would rather use their app.  But as we could see form our interviews the app that struggles on its own to get users.  Using the website doesn’t solve any problems the app have; it excludes the visitors who don’t have a smart phone.  

So over all its a good website so visit before you go to the museum, but won´t be so helpful during your visit. 

Interactive screens – State of the art analysis

UPDATED!

Currently Tom Tits don’t use many screens at their exhibits and during my visits there I can’t recall any interactive screens at all only a small number of TV monitors. During the last years they have developed a mobile phone app, something that our visit showed haven’t got the result they wished, we only saw a few persons using it. Maybe they should consider interactive screens.

With screens they can present their information in a more exciting way. They can present it while the visitors are interacting with, and exploring the software of the screens. A good example of successful, or at least interesting, can be seen at an art museum in Cleveland. They have made a solution where you can make the same pose as famous artwork and draw a line and then it find your drawn line in an existing artwork. I think they have an interesting application where they make the visitor interact with the art works.

I think interactive screens can offer a great way to encourage kids and younger persons to visit and enjoy a museum visit and still add an extra dimension to middle-aged persons. Another thing that is an opportunity for customization is the ability to offer customized texts and languages for different visitors.

However the screens can offer an interesting solution for museums they have some problems. First of all screens are at the moment expensive. Especially big ones and when going down in price and size we might not get the wanted result. Another thing I have noticed on the ones I have tried is that they often “steal” attention from the exhibits and actually themselves becomes an enjoyment for the visitors. In my opinion we should try to make the screens to an aid during a visit at a museum. Furthermore the solutions I have had the pleasure to try have not been able to use by many people at the same time, instead it most have been one person – on screen. After a short research I have found that there are screens that have solved this problem through multi-touch and a big sized screen. Finally I would like to point out that even if the target group is big it might be difficult for older people to use the service. I have own experience of trying to teach my grandmother using a touch device and she struggle with touching small “button” and even not touch other things.

At Tom Tits they don’t have any problem with encourage their visitors to interact in the exhibitions. But they might take benefits of it in a more educational way. Today they have some short texts next to the experiments something that isn’t very attractive for kids. Width interactive screens they will be able to present it in a way which makes it more interesting for kids. I think the museum in Cleveland have made something great when they have incorporate body movements into educational purposes. I believe something similar could improve the visitor experience at Tom Tits.

State-Of-The-Art Group Analysis

‘Tom Tits Exp’ App

In conclusion it can be said that the app provides helpful information, is nicely illustrated and easy to use. Unfortunately it only aims for swedish speaking parents and isn’t used by as many people as we guess they’d hoped. Furthermore the usage without mobile internet is limited to orientation with the maps as extensive descriptions are only online available. This makes the app less enjoyable since you are dependent of the Internet. 

Some of the experiments that we found difficult to understand had no information text and where neither presented in the app. On this point we felt that the app failed as it could be a good complementary on the lacking information text.

Interactive screens

Interactive screens offer a new way for people to get to know the exhibitions at the same time as they are active. Especially it offers younger persons and kids, who are used to touch input systems, a funnier way to get information. However it can be hard for elderly people to use the benefits from it due to their inexperience of similar systems such as touchscreens on mobile phones. We also think it is important to develop a system where the screens don’t steal to much attention form the real exhibition. Instead it should be used as an aid to improve the overall experience. At Tom Tits we believe that they can use the benefits from screens or even make it to an exhibition of its own.

Website 

It’s a very good website where you can read about the experiments on the different floors, so that when you go there know what to expect. It doesn’t show all the experiments and the explanations of each experiment are very short. 

We think it´s very good of Tom Tits to show what they offer so that parents and other people with children can get an idea of what to expect and see if it is something for them. Therefore the website is more for those who think one step ahead or haven’t been there before. Since our study focused on when you are already there and how to get information and explanations we tried to visit the website by my phone and got disappointed. It didn’t adapt to the screen so it was hard to read and navigate. So if we wanted to know something about an experiment and didn't get satisfied with the information signs we would rather use their app.

Exercise 2 - Isabella Richiello

Interview with father visiting with his 7-year-old daughter

Interviewer=Bold text

Father=Normal text

Du är här med dina barn?

Ja, ett barn.

Hur gammal är hon?

Pappa: Hur gammal är du Tyra?

Dotter: Fem år, snart sex faktiskt.

Pappa: Det är första gången som Tyra är här, jag har varit här ganska ofta.

Vi har olika dragningskrafter, vi har alltså inte exakt samma intressen.

Vad har ni för olika intressen?

Hon vill vara mer där nere. Hon vill vara nere i läskiga mörka rummet, dit jag inte vågar gå in i. Men det är mycket intryck för en femåring, hon ville fika direkt.

Hur kommer det sig att du kommer tillbaka till Tom Tits?

Jag tycker att det här är jätte spännande och det är väldigt utvecklande för barnen, jag själv jobbar ju i skolan så det hänger ganska mycket på det. Sen har man ju kul själv. Jag var med när de byggde det här, var med hela vägen och utvecklade. Då var det bara våningen där nere när man kommer in och bara det tyckte man vara helt fantastiskt.

Känner ni att det är bra att ni får vara delaktiga och hjälpa till?

Ja, allt som är interaktivt är roligt och spännande.

Vill ni låta barnen förstå själva?

Jo, jag får jobba på att inte lägga mig i så mycket. Hon är lite liten för vissa grejer.

Finns det tillräckligt med information här på plats om hon har någon fråga kring något eller är de viktigare att hon försöker?

Det är viktigare att hon försöker, hon är inte intresserad av förklaringar än så länge märker jag. Sen har jag ju äldre barn som är det men nej.

Vad har du tyckt vart roligast idag Tyra?

Såpbubbleshow.

Känner du till appen som finns?

Nej, har inte lagt märke till den.

Vi förklarar appen…

Det är jättebra att man kan läsa på en gång. För det saknar jag, det finns ju en bok eller guide men vissa grejer förstår man inte riktigt hur man ska göra. Och det skulle vara jättebra med en app då.

Att ha mobilen framme skulle alltså vara helt ok och inte störa?

Nej.

Någon tanke kring något du saknar här?

Jag saknar min mamma.

I thought that this interview was interesting since it gave a perspective of that parents do have fun while going around with their kids. He tells us that his daughter mostly wanted to spend time on the first level. Tom Tits first level is full of try it yourself experiments meanwhile for example you find the illustration section on level three. He says that he thinks this is because of her young age and careless thoughts of understanding; the touching and trying is more fun than the actual understanding part of what and why it’s happening. I think this is something useful for us during this project since most of the visitors were around his daughter age, which I noticed while observing other. Reasons he comes back are partly because he also enjoys the museums experiments and likes to try them himself. This makes me more convinced of keeping our target group as parents with children. One of the things we wanted to investigate was if parents maybe rather sit down and relax while their children play. But in this interview and others the parent is glad to be a part of trying out and seeing experiments along side their child. It’s also encouraging knowing that he says that the idea of implementing technology to the museum is a positive thing.

                                                                                                                                                               

State-of-the-art analysis

Tom Tits has a mobile application called Tom Tits Exp. In this app you can find information about the museum and its experiments. The target group for the app is everybody that has a smart phone or tablet with preferably access to Internet.

There are three tab pages; Info, Karta and Experiment.

In the first tab, Info, you find information such as opening hours, ticket prices, location and a short text about the application in divided blocks. For more information than the short one given you have to click on the link beneath each block which connects you to their website. I feel this is something unnecessary since the app should be able to provide all the simple information without constraining the user to visit the website. For example in the block opening hours, “Öppettider”, the actual opening hours are not mentioned. The information you find is that they are open all year round, they have extended opening hours during holidays and you can find cafes, store and restaurant there. As a user I would find this irritating as the blocks name, “Öppettider”, promises me to find a specific information only to realize that I have to connect to the website to get that information I wanted. It ruins the purpose of the app since you still are dependent of the website.

The next tab is map, “Karta”, where you find a map of Tom Tits. All the four levels and the outside park are included which is a positive thing. The buttons for switching from one level to another are at the bottom of the screen and very small. You can zoom in on the map and move around easily.  All the rooms have a small bubble you can click on to see its name. Some are only seen as you zoom in on a room. Also only some of those bubbles are links that lead to further information about the room. They show a short explanation of the room, and the user has a button to share it on e.g. Facebook. I feel that idea of giving the user a possibility to share a location on Facebook is smart but poorly implemented on this app. It’s hard to find it and easily missed since it’s only on two of the bubbles on the map.

The last tab is a list on the experiments on Tom Tits. The text information is small and hard to read on a small screen. Information about what it is and how to use it is mixed and the user is not given the opportunity to sort out text. Some users with small children only care about how to make it work and not about its background. It also takes time to type in the name of the experiment and search for it.

The first thing we noticed when trying the app is that all the experiments are not listed. There was a father with his young daughter during our visit that was actually using the Tom Tits Exp app, he tried the app for the first time on an experiment that had no explanation sign. While observing him we noticed he couldn’t find the experiments explanation on the app. We encountered this man at the end of our visit and asked how his experience with the app had been through out his visit. He told us that he actually gave up after not being able to find the first experiment. This is a good example for showing that trust from a user is easily lost when technology doesn’t live up to a their expectations.

The app should be helpful when you can’t turn to other things as information signs or staff, and this app fails on that point.

Some ideas to make the explanations easier are to make them more visual than written. A simple thing as a .gif could help the user understand how an experiment works.

While interviewing parents we also noticed that many of them didn’t even notice or know there is an app available. The information about the app could be more displayed for the visitors, especially on the website so they have time to navigate around before the visit.