Persona: Porky Paul

Overview:

Paul Anderson, known to his mates as Porky Paul, is 9 years old and has been oven weight since he can first remember. His housewife mother and twin older brothers (Lardy Luke and Chubby Charles) are also over weight, his dad is of medium build and works at the local council where he earns around £25,000 per annum. Paul lives in a small town surrounded by countryside landscapes, but often finds himself bored with there being little for young people to do in town.

Eating Habits:

Paul's mum is half Italian and as a result, Paul has developed a taste for lasagna, pizza and large portions!

A day in the life:

Paul walks to and from school with his brothers, it takes about 5 minutes. At school, Paul is teased for being overweight and as a result his least favourite lesson is P.E. He is always picked last. Paul tries hard to impress the kids at school by larking about and playing the fool; he often finds himself in trouble with teachers although never for anything serious. Paul's favourite lesson is drama where he can really let his bubbly personality carry him.
Paul spends most of his time at home watching TV, he loves cooking shows and aspires to own an Italian restaurant when he's older; he enjoys helping his mum in the kitchen.

Goals, fears and aspirations:

Paul's main goal is to open his own restaurant. Paul loves being on stage and being center of attention. He sometimes gets upset by bullies and is not worried about his weight.
Paul's dad is concerned about his children and their growing weight problems and tries to encourage Luke, Charles and Paul to get active and eat better but his words appear to fall on deaf ears.

Computer skills:

Paul's family has a PC at home which they share, but he doesnt get much use out of it. He has a games console in his room which he plays at least twice a week.

Market size and influence:

This has already been stated on Elliot’s persona.

Persona: General Joe

Overview:

Joe is 8 years old and is a reasonably bright young boy who achieves an average of grade B in his school work. He's an only child and lives with his parents who both work, however his Mother still manages to get home in time to pick him up from school each day.

Joe, like many boys his age, loves playing video games. However, he rarely completes them as he soon gets stuck on a level or becomes bored of them. Unfortunately for Joe, he lives in a big city in a house by a main road, this means he is unable to play outside with his friends except for in his small back garden.

His parents have a combined salary of £65,000 a year and can afford an up-to-date home PC and broadband internet connection which Joe is allowed to use under supervision. Joe's parents will not allow him to own a mobile phone as they believe he is not yet old enough and that he does not need one.

Eating Habits:

Joe is only allowed to buy sweets on a Friday afternoon after school, and is not allowed to drink fizzy beverages on weekdays. His Mother tries to cook a variety of meals every evening, however they usually eat a take out once a week when she is too busy to cook. Joe eats school lunches as his parents do not have enough time to prepare a packed lunch for him each day.

Hobbies:

Joe’s hobbies includes bike riding in the local park at weekend and playing video games. He is also currently learning to swim.

A day in the life:

Joe is driven to school each morning by his Mother on her way to work. His favourite subject at school is History as he likes to listen to stories and learn about how other people have lived. He is not particularly bad at any subject, but he is not at the top of the class for any of them either. At break time he really enjoys pretending to be some of the historic characters he has learnt about with his friends, he especially likes to play at being the King of England. After school his Mother drives him home, on the odd occasion he goes home with a friend to play at their house and have dinner there. He is a member of the local Cubs group which meet every Tuesday after school and has a swimming lesson every Saturday morning.

Goals, fears and aspirations:

Joe is not really sure what he wants to do when he grows up and like most children his age goes through phases of what he is interested in, last year he really wanted to be a policeman but now he wants to be a dentist!

Computer skills:

Joe uses a computer at school at least once a week and occasionally uses his home computer to browse the internet (usually the CBBC site). He uses game consoles more than his home computer as he is able to load the games on his own without his parents help.

Market size and influence:

This has already been stated on Elliot’s persona.


References:
General Joe's photograph was found on this site

Persona: Tentative Tracy

Overview:

Tracy Burke is a 9 year old girl who lives with her parents Ethan and Julietter in Guildford, Surrey. She has a slim build and an above average height. Tracy has an older brother, Andrew (13 years old), who is a member of the Sanchez Casal Academy in Barcelona (Tennis Academy), which means she doesn’t see him very often. He is considered a hot prospect in the future of British Tennis.

Her parents have been married for 15 years and relocated to Guildford ten years ago when they both were given new positions in their consultancy work; leaving their busy London lives behind. It came at a good stage in their lives, as Andrew was still a young child and Ethan and Juliette were hoping for another addition to the family in the near future.

Tracy’s parents have excellent salaries working in the research parks in Guildford and Juliette also does some lecturing at Surrey University too, giving the family an income of over 80k. However the family do not live in a big, oversized home, instead prefering a smaller more suitable abode.

Tracy sometimes feels like she is living in her brother’s atheletic shadow, as her parents sometimes nag her to be more sporty at school but this is misunderstood by Tracy, because they only want her to lead a fit and healthy life.

Eating habits:

Tracy enjoys eating a range of 'unusual' (in terms of what other children eat) foods as her parents have tried to educate her into eating healthily. Her favourite meals usually include some kind of fish, such as Haddock, Alaskan Pollock and Swordfish. Tracy is allowed to eat snacks, but her parent’s try to make sure that she eats five pieces of fruit and vegetables a day, but when Tracy is at school or at a friend’s house she sometimes forgets her good eating habits and indulges in chocolate.

Academic record:

Tracy has an average academic record, but this could be improved through the use of new teaching methods. She frequently daydreams in class when the teacher does a ‘talk and chalk’ style lesson. Tracy struggles to build up a relationship with her teachers, and although she is quite bubbly in the playground with her friends, appears as the quiet girl in class. Her favourite lesson is Science as she enjoys doing experiments.

Hobbies

Tracy likes playing sports, but doesn't take part in some sports because she is embarrassed at her skill levels. She can't ride a bike and can't swim confidently, but she is taking lessons.

A day in the life:

As most children, Tracy goes to her school, Boxgrove Primary School, every weekday. She gets up at 8am and has breakfast with the family, before her father goes out to work. Juliette starts work later so that she can take Tracy to school by car. After school, Tracy is picked up by Ethan and they usually go straight home. Ethan usually starts cooking the dinner shortly after. On Wednesdays Tracy has started to go to Girl Guides with her friend Beth, so Ethan usually works later that day because he knows Beth’s mother will pick her up. In the evenings Tracy spends a maxium of two hours either watching T.V. or on her computer (set by her parents) before she then spends quality time with her parents or practices her reading. She goes to bed between 9 and 10pm.

Goals, fears and aspirations:

Tracy’s main goals are to learn how to ride her bike and to learn to swim, so that she can go swimming with her friends.

Tracy is scared of doing something embarassing and having people laugh at her. She is also scared of losing her friends and secretly fears not seeing her brother often in the future.

Tracy loves animals and has several of her own and she hopes to one day work with animals.

Computer skills:

Tracy owns her own computer in her room, but her parents monitor what she does on it from another computer. They strictly forbid her to go on chatrooms. Tracy mostly uses her computer for school work and for playing games.

Market size and influence:

According to wikipedia, children aged 0-14 made up 18% of the population in the year 2005, of those 48.77% were female (5,293,871 females to 5,560,489 male children).

Information about the demographics of the United Kingdom can be found at wikipedia

Persona: Fitness Freddie

Overview:

Freddie Ford is a 10 year old boy who loves sport so much that his mates have given him the nick name 'Fitness Freddie'. He lives with his parents Louise and Mark and older brother Steven in Doncaster.

Freddie’s parents have a joint yearly income of 48k. Freddie’s mother Louise works as a maths teacher in the local high school as has been there for 7 years. Freddie’s farther Mark works as a manager of an electrical store in the closest town centre. Mark has been working his way up in the store now for 15years. Mark and Louise have been married and have been living in Doncaster for 11years.

Freddie’s older brother Steven is currently a student studying his A-levels at college in sport, biology and history. He is a member of the local football clubs under 21’s team and trains with the team of a weekend.

Freddie is inspired by his brother’s achievement in football and has become a great fan of the sport.

Eating Habits:

Freddie is encouraged by his parents to eat healthily and on most evenings he eats vegetables and meat or fish for dinner. On occasion the family do have takeaways or pizza, but the majority of the time they stick with eating more healthy food. On average Freddie has ham sandwiches for lunch when his at school with some piece of fruit. His parents do try and get Freddie to eat around 5 pieces of fruit/vegetables a day.

Hobbies:

Freddie hobbies include football and swimming.

A day in the life:

At school Freddie's favourite subject is physical education (P.E) and has become the star pupil in most sporting events that the school participates in. In other subjects Freddie has to take, he has become an underachiever due to his mind always being focused on sport and having difficulties in reading and writing due to being dyslexic. As a result his grades are not as good as he gets in P.E.

Out of school Freddie likes to play his favourite sports, which include swimming and football. He is a member of a minor football club, which he also participates in of a weekend.

Freddie's parents encourage him to perform well in all his subjects at school but can see that his interests lie mostly in sport, which is where they push him the most as they know he enjoys this field.

Goals, fears and aspirations:

Freddie’s main goal is to become a professional football player and play for a mainstream club.

Freddie is slightly concerned about his other subject, as he knows his interests lie mostly in sport. For this reason he hopes that he gets really good at football as this is his main dream and does not rely as such on his other subjects.

Computer skills:

Freddie’s parents have a computer which can be used for school work and for personal use, but as Freddie is more interested in sport he rarely uses it and therefore does not have much experience on it.

Market size and influence:

will be stated by Elliot Hyde in a later post.

Picture is from here