Using Cultural Probes to Inspire the Design of Children's Technology
The project involves the exploration of methods for designing new technology to enhance the teaching and learning of difficult scientific concepts. A Cultural Probe will be used with students to gain an "insider’s" perspective on learning within the classroom environment and ways in which they see technology having an impact on learning. Data collected will be used to inform the design of a prototype of a hardware / software toolkit to facilitate scientific data collection, visualisation and sharing.
An Active Design Space: Engaging Children in a Virtual Participatory Design Process
This project involves the development of a design environment; a design environment which embodies both a process and a product. The process which underpins the project has at its core the notion of cooperation, where children and a software developer work together in a virtual participatory design environment. The educational product is the participatory design environment itself, an evolving, flexible environment designed to engage children in social, constructive learning. The environment will be open-ended, with children encouraged to reinterpret its functionality and use it in unexpected ways. As such is has the features of a technology probe identified by Hutchinson et al. (2003).
Hutchinson, H., Mackay, W., Westerlund, B., Bederson, B. B., Druin, A., Plaisant, C., Beaudouin-Lafon, B., Conversy, S., Evans, H., Hansen, H., Roussel, N., Eiderbäck, B., Lindquist, S., and Sundblad, Y. Technology Probes: inspiring design for and with families. In Proc. CHI 2003, ACM Press (2003), 17-24.
Tangible Educational Technology for Children
Technology for young children at present seems to narrow the focus of interaction, rather than expanding interaction opportunities. This project looks at the design of flexible technology that might be used to augment kindergarten resources (e.g. having a voice component that could be added to a teddy bear, a car or a block tower). The outcome of this project is a prototype device/system which engages young children in interactions which are flexible, social and portable.
Networked Computer Games for Learning
The aim of this project is to explore the potential of networked computer game technologies for learning. The final product will allow school students to populate a virtual environment with agents and objects to create an educational game that that they can share with their friends across a network.