Observation

While the gymnasts trained as normal, I observed their activity with the equipment that was in the gym already. I already have experience working with kids in athletics, as I work as both a competitive swim and martial arts instructor. This took a few hours to complete on my part.

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(Summary including information from fellow researchers): We observed the gymnasts and trainers at ISF on 3 separate days, compiling our information together, and going over what we found to find a problem, and a solution. The main issue we found involved memory retention and motivation for the gymnasts, as well as a lack of possible involvement with parents during the workout. With this in mind, we began brainstorming possible ideas to solve these problems. After coming up with multiple ideas, we settled on the concept of a watch that uses characters to motivate the gymnast, and tell the gymnast what to do next. This watch also monitors the gymnast's vitals. It's linked to a tablet used by the trainers, which can select the exercises of the day in the same style as the "to do - done" velcro schedules used already, and sending these exercises to the watch for the gymnast to interact with. With each exercise completed, the gymnast earns points to be used to earn prizes. Parents interact with the gymnast with a parent app, which receives live updated of the gymnast's vitals through the watch and/or tablet.

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Results

From this observation, we came up with a proposed solution: a smartwatch-like device that links to a tablet. The trainer who observes the gymnast uses the tablet to select exercises for the gymnast and monitor the gymnast's vitals. The smartwatch-like device displays a character of the gymnast's choosing and uses voice clips, text, and graphics to motivate the gymnast.

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Storyboard