Comments from Storyboards
March 17, 2003
- Your graphics, rock :) - copyrights, though?
- careful though: white on yellow = hard to read
- You can't assume that they can interpolate in-between dates on a time
line
- additions of fire safety bits? - more relevant to them?
- "practice" is confusing word here... keep it a verb, but more specific:
learn?
- choose equipment by where it goes on the truck? outfit of firefighter?
- I like the whole alert concept. I think there ought to be more
differentiation between the game and the slides - If they look and feel the
same, why bother having two?
- I really like Will's story diea for whether they get the correct pieces
assembled.
- Will background be black?
- technical terms in both languages?
- categorize information about fires? (size, damage, #firefighters involved)
- images... lots of action shots
- Kids sense of time is different... how can you relate time? show picture of
person who was involved and kids can see that this was back when grandma was
young or dad was young
- Alert is a great idea!
- 2nd graders - compressed oxygen? Can they click on equipment to get
description?
- I like the idea of having feedback be in the story
- Ideas for game:
- Explore firefighters in time room
- Click on flashing red light to view alert
- Take a "certification test"
- Read a newspaper from different times
- View fire statistics
- I would suggest making a distinction between the practice mode and the
actual game mode such that it doesn't become too repetitive. I'm not sure how
different they can be given the set amount of information you have to convey,
yet even a slight difference would probably be enough in making the game more
exciting as they await the alert.
- I really like the "Alert" idea.
- As you know, you need to figure out a source for, or way to
create, images you have a right to use in this program. Before
you search/create too much, however, you might try to figure out
all the uses to which you'll put the images, as this may help in
figuring out the sorts of images you need. For example, you may
want/need images that are clear/compelling at different
magnifications (esp. if you decide to use them in games like
puzzles or Concentration as the user waits for an Alert), and
share backgrounds, contexts, etc. You may want to settle on
the historical images first, and then create the 2000 images
in ways that recall or are just consistent with the older images.
- I never really understood why a user would choose to "study
more" while using this program. But that aside, one formidable
challenge you face is how to motivate the user to know/
learn as much as possible, and/or to reward the user for knowing/
learning as much as possible. If the stakes involved in firefighting
weren't life & death, such an incentive system would be obvious
(e.g. points, etc.) but as you can't very well have users who
don't do well be faced with lost lives/buildings/etc. as a result
of their not-knowing, you'll need to be very creative in dealing
with motivation/evaluation.
- Similarly, and a concern you share with the Club DNA group, is
how to encourage students to use and/or search out all the different
components of your program. This is especially challenging if
you decide to make each "session" short (e.g. asking the user to
identify only the equipment for a given fire, rather than the
equipment & clothing & firehouse, etc.). I admit that I favor
short session structure that would allow the user to spend more
time with the program by playing multiple times rather than have
all the elements a part of every session; but, of course, this
is a decision you'll make in consultation with Ms. Weinberg and
her students.
- Based on your presentation, the project description and what
I know of the Fortes School, your program is really meant to be
a kind of hybrid between educational software and an interactive
museum exhibit. This is very cool, and unique in the history of
CS92 projects. The reason you might keep both these aspects in mind
is that the edusoft literature rarely talks about the concerns
and challenges facing museum exhibitions. For example, an very
interesting paper about the latter, that might stimulate your
thinking in this project, is an account of some of the issues
that confronted the creation of the "African Voices" exhibition
at the Smithsonian. The paper comes from a journal called
AFRICAN ARTS (Summer 2001, Vol. 34 Issue 2) and the e-version:
http://search.epnet.com/direct.asp?an=5331532&db=aph
Yes, yes, it will also make you envious of all the great materials
they had to work with; but I think everyone might be interested in
the way the authors lay out the challenges and goals of the exhibit,
and the way they tried to solve certain problems with feedback (they
used what they called "challenge kiosks" which I think a very
cool idea).
- Obviously, the title "Men in Red" leaves out the reality and
history of women in fire departments today, and this raises
interesting questions about how to use elements of cultural
history in the program. For example, besides choosing which
images "match" certain time periods, how would you like your
users to be able to explain their choices? You mentioned
something about explaining the sorts of materials that were
used/available in each time period, and I wonder if/how those
explanations will have value in the way the user's performance
is evaluated. I.e. I know what you want your users to be able
to *do*, but not what you want them to *know*.