Ariel's Ocean Art: Encouraging Curiosity about Marine life
Game Design
Duration:
2 weeks
Team:
Individual Project
It is said that less than 20% of the ocean has been explored so far, which itself makes the ocean and the life under it so interesting. But how much do we even know about marine life? One can be taught and shown flowers, animals, etc., but when it comes to marine life, there are quite a lot of limitations.
In schools and textbooks, children are only taught about basic plants and animals, and they possess hardly any knowledge about the different species in nature.
Design Research
Conceptualization
Prototyping
Usability Testing
Gaps in Existing Solutions
While a lot of pretty kits exist, almost all kits contain similar types of species. For example all flower kits include roses, sunflowers and lotus
Most existing kits focus on making things look “pretty” rather than real. For example, flower kits usually include perfect, symmetrical roses or sunflowers where every petal looks the same. This takes away the small imperfections that make nature so interesting and real.
Solution
Based on these observations, a sea animal kit was designed to help children explore and learn about marine life in a fun and engaging way. Since most kids are familiar with only a few common animals and find some sea creatures strange or intimidating, the kit aims to make them more curious.
Other Projects
Research Findings
For the research, activity sheets were designed where children were asked to identify animals and flowers from images, along with perform creative tasks such as drawing three types of flowers and three types of sea shells. This was done to gain an understanding of their existing knowledge and familiarity with different species, especially beyond commonly known ones.
The primary research revealed that while most children were able to recognize common flowers, many confused similar-looking ones like petunia and hibiscus. When it came to marine life, their awareness was significantly lower, as most were unable to draw or identify different types of sea shells. This highlighted a limited exposure to underwater biodiversity. Additionally, some children perceived certain sea creatures as weird or scary due to their unfamiliar forms. Overall, the findings pointed towards a gap in both knowledge and comfort with marine life.
Packaging
Positioning the kit around Ariel creates an instant emotional connection with children, especially young girls. As a familiar character associated with the ocean, she makes marine life feel friendly and approachable rather than unfamiliar or intimidating. This is important as some children initially perceived certain sea creatures as strange or scary. Framing the kit within Ariel’s world makes the experience more engaging while also increasing its visual appeal and marketability.
Key Takeaway
This project highlights how simple, playful interventions can shape a child’s understanding of the natural world. Besides, the concept has strong potential to be expanded into a larger, modular system of learning kits. Since the current kit includes multiple species, additional magnetic sets can be introduced and sold separately, allowing children to gradually build their collection without needing to purchase an entirely new kit each time. This makes the product more cost-effective while increasing long-term engagement. The idea can also be extended into different themes such as birds, flowers, insects, and polar animals, each introducing a new set of species and environments. Additionally, the use of familiar characters on packaging, such as Rapunzel for a flower kit, Elsa for a polar animals kit, can be adapted across themes to enhance relatability and appeal, creating a cohesive and scalable product line.