Home // International Journal On Advances in Life Sciences, volume 2, numbers 1 and 2, 2010 // View article

User Experiences with Mobile Supervision of School Attendance

Authors:
Mari Ervasti
Marianne Kinnula
Minna Isomursu

Keywords: Near Field Communication; attendance supervision; school; children; technology adoption; user experience; value-based design

Abstract:
This article presents a field study arranged at a Finnish primary school where two classes and a total of 23 pupils between the ages of 6 and 8 trialed an attendance supervision system supported by Near Field Communication (NFC) technology. In the trial the pupils marked their arrival at and departure from school by touching a reader device or a NFC-enabled mobile phone with a contactless smart card. Parents were able to get their children’s attendance details via an online ‘citizen’s portal’ and through text-messages sent to their mobile phones. The system was designed to simplify attendance monitoring and to replace teachers’ manual roll calls. Information about user experience was obtained by using a variety of data collection methods. We evaluate how various aspects identified in new technology adoption affect the design processes of home-school interaction systems by examining the findings from the viewpoint of three end-user groups (children, parents and teachers). Our analysis also shows that a technology supported attendance supervision system can bring value for all end-user groups but it seems that the system will serve primarily the teachers and the parents.

Pages: 29 to 41

Copyright: Copyright (c) to authors, 2010. Used with permission.

Publication date: September 5, 2010

Published in: journal

ISSN: 1942-2660