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Enhancing Socialization Skills for Students
Manav Arora, Hannah Carney, Brandon Sia, Dominic Spatola, Luke Snyder
This project was developed as part of the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering course The Art of Making: An Introduction to Hand-On System Design and Engineering
MOTIVATION & QUESTION FRAMING
MOTIVATION & QUESTION FRAMING
60% of Parents report COVID-19 had a NEGATIVE impact on their child's social-emotional development
60% of Parents report COVID-19 had a NEGATIVE impact on their child's social-emotional development
HOW MIGHT WE Encourage Young Students to Interact with New Peers?
HOW MIGHT WE Encourage Young Students to Interact with New Peers?
Primary Users
Primary Users
Students in Elementary School
Primary Stakeholders
Primary Stakeholders
Teachers
(Pictured: Mrs. Becca Wright, a third grade teacher at Falk Laboratory School)
From interviews and observations of 2 classrooms, at the Falk Laboratory School, and 2 interviews with professionals, we discovered that students would typically choose recess activities by interest, but if there weren't many other participants, they would be left wandering around. When they attempted to join activity, conflict would ensue because the student would join and change all the rules.
DESIGN PROCESS
DESIGN PROCESS
We looked to prior arts that stimulated socialization for young students to see what they did do, didn't do, and how they could be improved.
Looking at playground and classroom settings, they attempt to foster social interactions by placing students in close proximity and hoping that will cause students to interact.
BUT close proximity DOES NOT necessarily foster social interactions.
Design Goals
Design Goals
Effective
Effective
Fosters at least one interaction with students
Intuitive
Intuitive
Average score of 7 on a scale of 1(Confusing) to 10(Easy)
Popular
Popular
Over 75% of students use Social Sprout
Implementable
Implementable
Takes less than 5 minutes of instructional time
THE SOLUTION
THE SOLUTION
Features
Features
Anonymous voting so students are influenced by peer pressure.
Option to change activity after whole class decides recess activities so students can adjust activities if there are too many or few people playing that activity.
Live update of activities distribution for ease of use.
Can toggle table showing distribution of activities so teachers can selectively reveal activities after everyone has chosen an activity.
Online format to reduce physical size and make Social Sprout available anywhere with internet.
How it works
How it works
TESTING & RESULTS
TESTING & RESULTS
Final Social Sprout Video.mp4After using Social Sprout once, 8 of 23 students in Mrs. Wright's class played with someone new. We see that as eight opportunities for a new friend.
Effective
Effective
8/23 students played with someone new
Intuitive
Intuitive
The touchpad was hard to use with the small radio buttons.
Popular
Popular
100% of the class used Social Sprout
Implementable
Implementable
Took over 10 minutes for everyone to vote
Moving Forward
Moving Forward
Possible Improvements
Make Social Sprout easier for children to use. Possibly by utilizing a touch screen.
Add a teacher view that displays individual student's responded.
Make it easy for teacher's to switch the activities displayed to match class interests.
Other Avenues
We have been exploring the possibility of applying a similar solution in other areas, particularly in healthcare settings.
We have considered:
Pediatric hospital
Nursing home
Children's home
Acknowledgments
Acknowledgments
Thank you to Dr. Joseph Samosky, Kevork Zeibari, Reece Basehore, and the Art of Making Staff for all their help, support, advice, and encouragement. Thank you to Mr. Tim Wagner, Dr. Beth Hoffman, Ms. Colleen O'Conner, and Ms. Lindsey O'Sullivan for their help with outread and problem discovery. Thank you to Ms. Becka Wright and her third grade class for testing Social Sprout.
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