Embedded Files
The company: Roominate is a toy company that makes toys aimed to teach children (especially girls) about engineering and spark their interest in STEM.
My role: App design intern
My top deliverables:
- Redesigned app home page
- Produced a tutorial for using rPower, Roominate's Bluetooth-powered part of the toy, with an emphasis on a young audience that could not read
- Designed content organization structure for Roominate content (character bios, design challenges, rPower controller)
1. Redesigned app home page
The task of redesigning the home page was one of making it more visually exciting, making it more accessible to kids that couldn't read, and integrating a couple new parts of the app.
The original homepage design had a lot of empty space, offered no pictorial interpretation for kids who cannot read, and did not gel well with the feel of the rest of the app.
The final version of the homepage made better use of space, offered icons to indicate meaning without relying solely on words, and was more cohesive with Roominate World (the content within the app) by using textures and icon styles consistent with product pieces and the internal content.
2. Produced a tutorial for rPower
rPower enabled users to control their hardware (lights, motors, etc.) with software.
A major takeaway from showing my first tutorial to children was that too many steps were lumped together. My next iteration split complex steps into simple ones, devoting a screen to each small step. Takeaway from this round of user testing: Many young children can not read well, and my tutorial involved many advance vocabulary words (adapter, Bluetooth, motors and controllers). In these early prototypes, information was conveyed partially with pictures but mostly with words. If one looked at the pictures alone, many steps were skipped, which led to frustrated and confused children. I iterated on my tutorial, making it possible to comprehend all content with pictures alone if needed, which catered to a wider subset of the intended audience than before.
This image links to an interactive prototype for an early rPower tutorial. This version was too focused on words to convey the instructions.
This image links to a later (but still early) prototype of an rPower tutorial. This version used far fewer words to convey instructions.
3. Designed content organization structure
When I joined at Roominate, the toys' companion app only housed the rPower controller. The team had a lot of content to be arranged in the app. I was tasked with designing an organization system and navigation flow that was intuitive for young users. After I designed, iterated, and tested, I sent my pixel-perfect mockups and artwork assets to the development team.
This image links to an interactive wireframe mockup of the app’s content organization and rPower tutorial.
This image links to an interactive prototype with final artwork and flow that very closely resembles the app that appeared in the App Store.
Additional work/assets from Roominate:
app flow diagram
flow diagram.pdfproduct shoots (staging and execution) and content creation for the app, retail sticker packs, and retail packaging
amusementPark.pdfspellingBee.pdfGoogle Sites
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