What is a week?

I have now conducted all five interview user studies. I talked to 5 mothers, 2 fathers and 6 children in total . Naturally, the families were all different and I must admit that I am finding it really hard to discern common behaviors and needs.

The first family I interviewed was very experienced and advanced when it comes to both technology and traveling. Not only did the parents travel frequently, they were also fairly experienced geocashers. Thus, it doesn't surprise me that their daughter was very interested in maps and traveling. None of the other children I talked to seemed to share that interest. Rather, their focus (if any) was on:

1. time ("When is mum coming home?")
2. activities ("Why is dad going on this conference? What is a conference? Was his day O.K?")

I would say that time was the one most obvious concern in all families. I already mentioned that the children's limited sense of time was a common concern. In addition, the time difference makes communicating a lot more complicated, since it restricts the families' (already) tight schedules.

I started reading the three books I ordered a while ago, and so far Charlie Hudson's (who apparently is a woman!) book The Parent's guide to business travel has impressed me the most. In the book Charlie dedicates a whole chapter ("How long is a week?") to 0-5 year-old children and their sense of time. I quote her:

Ages Three to Five

The ability to grasp the concept of "trip" is easier in these years, although understanding the passage of time will probably be limited; hence the title of this chapter, "What is a week?" Forging and maintaining a strong communication link during absence is important and can span from low-tech to the latest electronic gadgets - only the means of communication should change as your children advance in age...

The second challenge was keeping in touch with my son and, while I called on a regular basis, a preschooler doesn't have a lot to say during a phone conversation. I would send him cute postcards or greeting cards with a sentence or two, although that first summer I wasn't aware of how meaningful those cards were to him. I missed a couple of weeks due to very heavy workload, and my father said that one day when he went to the mailbox and pulled out some kind of advertisement that was on a colorful card, my son eagerly took it and said, "This is for me from Mommy... My son was too young to care what I wrote, and the messages [on the cards] were essentially all the same, but it didn't matter - he was getting "mail" from me that he could hold in his hand, and that was the important thing for him...

The key point at this age is that, just like the repeated question "Are we there yet?," small children do not distinguish segments of time well. It's crucial to find a method of counting days or weeks they are comfortable with so they can feel confident of when they will see you again. Otherwise, their question, "When are you coming home?" cannot be answered in a way they understand, and it will reinforce the frightening thought that you aren't really going to return.

This is also the age when it may be difficult to distinguish between imagination and reality, and a child may become fearful of something that doesn't occur to you. For example, if you have taken a trip to Arizona, but your child doesn't know where or even what Arizona is, he or she may conjure up disturbing images of you in a terrible place.

Another common feature is that bedtime seemed to be the most cherished and valuable time of the day. All five families mentioned that, if possible, bedtime is when the distributed family members would talk on the phone. The procedure of saying "Goodnight" seemed to be very important.