A Conceptual Model for Knowledge Dimensions and Processes in Design and Technology Projects

The present study sheds new light on the knowledge dimensions and processes that occur when designing new concepts and prototypes in higher education. In particular, this study aims to develop the conceptual understanding of activities and processes that help students to gain new knowledge and understanding while designing new products and services. I employed two data collection phases among undergraduate students with qualitative abductive data analyses in order to create a conceptual framework for understanding how new knowledge is created and managed in students’ social interactions. This framework also enables us to distinguish the user, business, technological and methodological knowledge dimensions that constitute the elemental perspectives for design processes. This study emphasises the need for students to use diverse methods to gain new knowledge for inventing and designing new technological solutions

Embedding Virtual Objects Into the Physical World: Student-Centred Augmented Reality Concept Design and Development

In the contemporary world where almost, everything has moved towards digitalisation, the combination of virtual and physical worlds has proved to be an efficient approach in an educational context. Since the application of augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) in education is on the rise, we recommend a conceptual framework for technology education. However, little is known about how students mix virtual and physical objects in solving everyday problems through prototyping and envisioning the potential solution. This study is based on the gathering and analysis of qualitative and quantitative data on students in higher education. In the first study, we collected (N = 100) information about potential problem-solving contexts for augmented and virtual reality applications. In addition, this study examines student (N = 62) projects in the AR and VR fields to generate new knowledge about co-creation activities in design processes. The results reveal that when students design and develop virtual objects in connection to the physical world, they learn more than just using digital technology alone. Combining the virtual with the physical world provides an extensive learning environment not only for digital problem solving but also for materialistic and physical surroundings. This paper contributes a new theoretical understanding for academicians about the role of AR in technology education and a conceptual framework for practitioners to enhance student learning through AR-based design projects

Rapid Prototyping of a Mobile SaaS Application

Rapidly developing a customizable mobile application and the related software as a service (SaaS) is challenging and rarely studied. Traditionally, SaaS solutions are mainly accessed using personal computers, but the mobile SaaS solutions are needed in the tourism sector, for example, where users are mobile. This paper presents a case study where the original need was to design a customizable mobile tourism guide service for use by several small tourism companies, and to assess its functionality in a field study. The result of applying the Vaadin 6 Java web framework and LAMP technologies was a robust mobile application SaaS prototype system that fulfilled the essential design needs in the eight field test cases. This study shows that the field testing of a mobile concept can be completed easier when using Vaadin Java web framework, as it provides support for cross-platform functionality and GUI design, and completes, for example, LAMP-based SaaS solution. However, results point it out that new digital navigation features were needed to develop or improved and mobile web approach causes some usability challenges especially in the compass based navigation and user tracking. This study provides an example of how to develop a SaaS-based mobile service prototyping environment, which is needed while field testing new B2B mobile services with various groups of stakeholders. Our case study analysis reveal that the Vaadin development environment facilitates the rapid prototyping for digital services in an affordable way. The overall contribution of this paper is predominantly for software engineers and web application developers

Analysing the implementation of two distinct pedagogical approaches in higher education institution

This paper aims to reveal the outcomes of two distinct mobile application concept design and development courses at Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences. These courses have applied dissimilar pedagogical approaches that aim to design and develop innovative mobile application for their target users. The main goal of these courses was to teach students to conduct user studies and collect users’ requirements and design application concept accordingly. ICT professionals nowadays are expected to communicate and work in multidisciplinary teams to reach overall business goals. As a result, universities by offering courses such as User Centered Design (UCD) and usability engineering related courses prepare students with better competences on their highly competitive job markets. This study pursuits to identify the best teaching approaches for innovative product concept development at higher educational institutes by comparing the results of the two distinct pedagogical approaches User Centered Design and Customer Journey Mapping

The Stakeholders of a User-Centred Design Process in Mobile Service Development

The use of agile methods in mobile service development has gained much attention in software design research. In addition, involving the potential stakeholders of the mobile service in the design and development process has become vital in achieving the best service experience. Many application development methodologies, such as user-centred design (UCD), ensure that stakeholders have direct involvement in the design and development. This paper describes experiences of designing a mobile concept where various stakeholders, such as tourism companies, target application users, business experts and the application developers, were involved in the design and development process. The main focus of this paper is the roles and contributions of stakeholders in mobile services for outdoor activities such as kayaking, hiking and biking. These outdoor activities are associated with different functional and non-functional requirements that are essential considerations during the design and development process. Therefore, we utilized the UCD principle as an appropriate method of involving all stakeholders in the design process, and we show that hearing the stakeholders’ voice is vital in the design of outdoor-based mobile service development

Section VI, Introduction

  Methods and Agendas in Technology Education Click on the "pdf" button to open and readthe introduction to this section.  Methods and Agendas in Technology Education Click on the "pdf" button to open and readthe introduction to this section