Project 2: Observation
| Grading criteria | Guiding questions | Check minus | Check | Check plus |
| Activity and Method Choice (20%) |
What led you to observe this type of communication activity/setting? How did the methods fit the activity? | Picked an activity that was personally convenient. Picked a method that seemed easiest to conduct. | Thoughtful choice of why the communication activity/setting was important. Good reasons for why method was appropriate. | Picked an activity/setting that is interesting but not well-understood yet. Added some methodology twist to be able to meaningful observe this activity. |
| Observation work (30%) |
What type of observations did you make and how did you document them? | Observations presented seem obvious and do not bring much new to the table. | Good variety of interesting observations collected and documented. | Very detailed and insightful findings documented from observing diverse, representative participants. |
| Quality of data analysis (20%) |
Show us what you found and why it was interesting! Did anything surprise you or confirm something you thought was true? Is there an alternative conclusion you could come to from the data? | Unclear whether insight came from observations, or was simply what they were expecting. | Strong connection of how what they observed led to a new insight. Can explain how their insights are more convincing than alternative inferences from the data. | Insights are compelling or surprising, making good material for ideation, clearly focused on identifying a need from a user-centered perspective. |
| Communication through slide deck (20%) |
Can we get the main points from flipping through your stand-alone slide deck without you giving a presentation? | Needed more explanation to understand the main points, unclear how much observation work was done. | Presented process and insights in a clear way, could readily appreciate amount of observation work accomplished. | Creative and clever presentation of observation insights. Gives strong feel for data collected. |
| Individual Reflection (10%) |
How well did your reflection demonstrate what you learned from the process? | Did not turn it in or did not convey that they learned anything new. | Communicates some surprise or something they would do differently next time. | Strong sense of how observation changed their perspective. |