Groups may submit just one paper for this assignment (but must submit separate papers for the midterm and final assignments).

You will do field work with your target audience to evaluate your initial design idea. Your field work includes both observation and interviews.

• Observation
  Visit your target audience in their normal educational setting. First, observe their normal practices carefully. If you are designing for a particular age school class, sit in on at least two classes of that subject and age. Talk to the instructor if observation is not appropriate or possible for the setting you've chosen.

  While you are there, take a few notes, but not so many that you intimidate people with your scribblings. Leave time in your schedule to go home and take copious notes immediately after your observation session. If you observe for an hour, reserve another hour to take notes once you're home. It's crucial that you do your observations on the same day. You will get much more useful notes than if you wait even a day.

• Interviews
  Interview at least one teacher (preferably two) and at least three students in your target audience. Tell them about your idea and ask for their input. Take some notes while you are talking, and lots more after you return home. You will tape-record interviews you do later in the course. Tape recording is not necessary at this stage, though you may do it if you wish. These initial interviews may be relatively short (10 minutes), or may run longer (up to an hour). Try to question your assumptions about your target audience and understand their perspective on things.

In your paper, discuss how you conducted your field work and what you found. In what ways did this lead you to revise your design?

Submit a detailed design plan, including sketches (which may be hand drawn). This should be more detailed and more thoroughly thought out that your first design plan.

Describe in detail how you are going to implement your software. If you have more than one team member, describe who is going to do each part. Give a week by week breakdown of what parts of the code will be finished. Leave at least one week for debugging and revisions.