25 February 2010

Today, I talked to some of the math team members, in preparation for Criterion K.
They said they had been using the site, and offered these comments:


-Well organized (separated into meets, events, with years for practice tests)
-Likes the summary of all equations, vocabulary
-And the practice tests which separate into years
-Likes the solved problems (work shown)
- Easy to use
-Good navigation.


They also mentioned it was now much easier to study.

1 March 2010

Today, I finished my Criterion K, shown below:
K Assessing the Social Significant of the Product

Observed Social Impact:
After the site was officially online, the link was placed on the math team section of edline.net, and recommended to math team students.
As a result of this, many students have begun to use this site as a guide.
For example, two of my testers, Jane Krot and Jasmin Shin, mentioned in their responses to the questionnaire that they would probably use the site in their studying; they, along with others, have done this. They mentioned that the formulas and examples were helpful to their understanding, and explained that they found the practice tests more accessible than before.

Predicted Social Impact:
I can only hope that this site will continue to be in use for the years to come. In the future, this site could be used as a study guide with much more widespread reach. The entire Mid-Pac math team would know about it. And, because the internet is assessable to everyone, students from other math teams, and even students looking for a challenging problem, would find this site useful. Overall, it will continue to spread mathematical knowledge, promote understanding, and make studying a little easier.

26 Friday 2010

Today, I finished my Criterion J, shown below:

J Testing and Evaluating the Solution

First Set of Refinements:

Beta Tester: Jane Krot

Jane is a qualified beta tester because she is a mathlete, having been on the team for three years. She knows the general process of testing and studying, and is aware of the current difficulties with finding information. By having her test my project, I will have an idea of how an average mathlete would view and navigate through the site. She would know if the layout was confusing, or if a formula was incorrect.

Refinements suggested:

-Several of the links were broken, or only worked on some of the pages

-Practice test pictures posed an issue. For nearly every test page, where there should have been three collapsible panels with test pictures, there were only broken images or tests that did not show up.

-Many of the practice tests that did show up were out of order

-Others were upside down

- Some of the scanned images are difficult to read

- Add more information to some of the later pages

(see questionnaire, figure 1.1 in appendix)

Refinements Made

1. I completely edited the practice test pages. Apparently, because all the test images were in different folders initially, many of them had the same name. When I uploaded the site, and all files were placed in the same folder, the duplicate-named images overwrote each other. As a result, only about five practice tests were actually uploaded.

To fix this, I renamed all of the images, then placed them all in the same folder to ensure that there was no duplication. I also have to fix the relative path in the dreamweaver program, so that the correct images were accessed. In addition, I rotated images so they were in the correct direction, and made sure the date on each tab-label coincided with the dates on the test.

(see figure 1.2, in appendix)

2. I went through and fixed all of the broken links and other broken images, changing the relative paths so that the pages would actually interconnect.

3. I added much more information to the end, so that all of the meets had the necessary formulas.

(see figure 1.3)

Second Set of Refinements

Beta Tester: Ms. Kashiwabara

Mrs. Kashiwabara is a qualified tester as she is both a math team coach and a math teacher. After having taught math at Mid-Pacific for nearly four years, she has the knowledge necessary to correct any mathematical mistakes. As a coach, she will oversee the use of the site, and help promote it to the various math team members.

Refinements Suggested:

-Try to eliminate hand-written formulas and images. A computer edited version would, she explained, look cleaner and better put together.

-Find a way to update the site, if necessary, so that it remains current. This would include operation after I left high school.

(see figure 2.1)

Refinements Made:
1. To address the first concern, I eliminated the hand-written formulas (although I did leave some of the completed problems as hand-written, as these were long and tedious to re-copy; the remaining images are, in my opinion, the easiest to read). I actually used LaTex, an online equation editor which made the task much easier and produced a nice result.

(figure 2.2)

2. To address the second concern, I added a "contact us" section to the page, and created an email address for the site. This would provide me with information on updates that need to be made.

(figure 2.3)

3. As I was going through to create these last two refinements, I noticed some broken images and links my tester had missed. I went through and fixed this. (figure 2.4)

Third Set of Refinements:

End-User Test: Jasmin Shin

Jasmin is a qualified tester because is, in fact, a typical end-user. She is a student on the Mid-Pacific math team, and has been affected by the inadequacies of the current situation. Her perspective will lend information as to how effective this site will be.

Revision Suggested:

- Mentioned many of the images were blurry/ hard to read/ too faint

- Recommended hi-lighted or colored text

- Wanted to know if an index or glossary could be added

- Mentioned that some of the images were broken

To see the full survey, view figure 3.1 (appendix)

Revisions made:

1. I changed the color of key-term text to a bright green, which called attention to them. (see figure 3.2)

2. I fixed broken images by moving the file location. (see figure 3.3)

3. I also removed many images, and replaced with formulas which written out with the LaTex editor. While I had left these images after the second set of refinements, believing them to be the most legible, my beta tester still had difficulty reading and understanding many of these images. (See figure 3.4)

K Assessing the Social Significant of the Product

Observed Social Impact:

After the site was officially online, the link was placed on the math team section of edline.net, and recommended to math team students.

As a result of this, many students have begun to use this site as a guide.

For example, two of my testers, Jane Krot and Jasmin Shin, mentioned in their responses to the questionnaire that they would probably use the site in their studying; they, along with others, have done this. They mentioned that the formulas and examples were helpful to their understanding, and explained that they found the practice tests more accessible than before.

Predicted Social Impact:

I can only hope that this site will continue to be in use for the years to come. In the future, this site could be used as a study guide with much more widespread reach. The entire Mid-Pac math team would know about it. And, because the internet is assessable to everyone, students from other math teams, and even students looking for a challenging problem, would find this site useful. Overall, it will continue to spread mathematical knowledge, promote understanding, and make studying a little easier.

24 February 2010

Today, I received back Jasmin's survey, and am able to complete my beta-testing.

Some of the revisions she suggested were:

22 February

I finally received back my questionnaire, for my second set of refinements. I made the changes as quickly as I could, also incorporating some things I had noticed earlier in my revisions.

For one, Ms. Kashiwabara suggested that I try to use less of the scanned tests and a greater amount of computer generated formulas. Looking at the images, and determining what was legible and what was not, I re-generated many of the formulas using an equation editor I found, LaTex (I had to go back, and add this to my Criterion I). This was faster than the previous method, as it allowed me to convert the formulas directly into .gif format. However, it was still rather tedious. I redid some of the formulas, but not all.

For example, here I replaced the picture with laTex

Before:

After:

In addition, I added a "contact us" section on the home page, in order to address Ms. Kash's concern that the site would need to be continually updated.

21 February 2010

Today, I gave the link to my project site, and a questionnaire, to one of my end-users, Jasmin Shin. I asked her to help me finish my testing, and made sure to set a deadline of next week Wednesday (Feb. 24). Although I have not yet made the changes for my second set of revisions, I have to get my testing done ASAP. I already updated the broken images and links which I found the other day, so I'm hoping the modifications requested involve a more broad set of modifications.
However, as I am nearing the end of my testing, and approaching my deadline, I am hoping that the site is reaching near completion, and only needs minor revisions.

20 February 2010

Today, I went through the site and noted any broken links and images.
I found several; there were many broken images on the geometry pages, and some awkward looking formulas (I had to change their alignment to absolute middle).