Fernando Garcia-Sanjuan

TangiWheel: A Widget for Manipulating Collections on Tabletop Displays Supporting Hybrid Input Modality

In this paper we present TangiWheel, a collection manipulation widget for tabletop displays. Our implementation is flexible, allowing either multi-touch or interaction, or even a hybrid scheme to better suit user choice and convenience. Different TangiWheel aspects and features are compared with other existing widgets for collection manipulation. The study reveals that TangiWheel is the first proposal to support a hybrid input modality with large resemblance levels between touch and tangible interaction styles. Several experiments were conducted to evaluate the techniques used in each input scheme for a better understanding of tangible surface interfaces in complex tasks performed by a single user (e.g., involving a typical master-slave exploration pattern). The results show that tangibles perform significantly better than fingers, despite dealing with a greater number of interactions, in situations that require a large number of acquisitions and basic manipulation tasks such as establishing location and orientation. However, when users have to perform multiple exploration and selection operations that do not require previous basic manipulation tasks, for instance when collections are fixed in the interface layout, touch input is significantly better in terms of required time and number of actions. Finally, when a more elastic collection layout or more complex additional insertion or displacement operations are needed, the hybrid and tangible approaches clearly outperform finger-based interactions.

Interactive technologies for preschool game-based instruction: Experiences and future challenges

Abstract According to current kindergarten curricula, game play is an important basis for children development and it is the main driving force when designing educational activities during early childhood. This paper presents a review of the current state of the art of game technologies that support pre-kindergarten and kindergarten children development. Moreover, the most emergent technologies for developing educational games for preschool children are identified and a set of future challenges are discussed. The main goal of this work is to review the state of the art in interactive technologies which will help educators, game designers and Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) experts in the area of game-based kindergarten instruction.

Tangibot: A tangible-mediated robot to support cognitive games for ageing people—A usability study

Abstract The ever increasing elderly population requires a revision of technology to make it usable and meaningful for them. Most applications take into account their reduced physical and cognitive abilities in order to provide assistive services, but this paper focuses on building technology to improve these capacities through cognitive games. We present Tangibot, a tangible-mediated robot aimed at enabling more intuitive and appealing interactions. A usability study conducted on subjects at three different levels of cognitive impairment (none, mild, and severe) reveals that it is usable and engaging for users with no or mild cognitive impairment, and even though it is less usable for persons with severe impairment, it triggers positive emotional reactions among them, which makes it promising for their use in therapeutic activities.

Around-Device Interactions: A Usability Study of Frame Markers in Acquisition Tasks

Digital tabletops present numerous benefits in face-to-face collaboration environments. However, their integration in real settings is complicated by cost and fixed location. In this respect, building table-like environments using several handheld devices such as tablets or smartphones provides a promising alternative but is limited to touch interaction only. We propose instead another kind of “around-device” interaction (ADI) technique using the built-in front camera of these devices and fiducial frame markers, which presents advantages including better awareness and less interference. This paper contributes a first step in exploring the potential of this interaction technique by conducting a usability test comparing several ergonomic factors that may have an effect on the very first operation of the interaction: the acquisition of the marker.

Design and evaluation of a tangible-mediated robot for kindergarten instruction

Entertainment technology increases childrens engagement in educational activities designed to develop abilities ranging from collaborative problem-solving and cognitive attention to self-esteem. However, little research has been done on designing educational and entertaining interactive technology for kindergarten children (up to 5 years old). Furthermore, most of the work in this area has considered traditional input devices such as the mouse and keyboard, which are not suitable for these very young children. More recently, other more intuitive means of interaction (touch and tangible interfaces) and advanced educational artifacts such as robots have emerged. In this work we therefore present a joint collaboration between technologists and kindergarten instructors to design and evaluate a technological platform using a mobile robot for kindergarten instruction, as well as an intuitive and user-friendly tangible user interface. The results obtained suggest the platform is not only usable by kindergarten children, but it also allows them to be fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity. In addition, the instructors reported that the system was well accepted and praised its versatility in use as a supporting tool for their everyday classroom activities.

MarkAirs: Around-Device Interactions with Tablets Using Fiducial Markers -- An Evaluation of Precision Tasks

This paper evaluates MarkAirs, an interaction technique that uses fiducial markers to perform mid-air interactions. MarkAirs offers several advantages: the proposed technique does not require any tracking external hardware other than the front camera of a mobile device; it is robust even when the markers are partially occluded; and it enables precise 2D manipulations (translation, rotation and scaling). An evaluation study points to the feasibility and precision of the proposed technique and the perceived usability and subjective workload impressions of the participants.

Toward a General Conceptualization of Multi-Display environments

Combining multiple displays in the same environment enables more immersive and rich experiences in which visualization and interaction can be improved. Although much research has been done in the field of Multi-Display Environments (MDEs) and previous studies have provided taxonomies to define them, these have usually consisted of partial descriptions. In this paper we propose a general taxonomy that identifies the key dimensions to tackle when developing MDEs and a classification of previous studies, with the aim of helping designers to identify the key aspects that must be addressed when developing the next generation of MDEs.

From Tabletops to Multi-Tablet Environments in Educational Scenarios: A Lightweight and Inexpensive Alternative

This work introduces a Multi-Display Environment (MDE) based on handheld devices to build tabletop-like experiences in an affordable, scalable, and simple way to foster collaboration in educational settings.

Evaluating the Usability of a Tangible-Mediated Robot for Kindergarten Children Instruction

The use of robots as an educational tool is particularly interesting because of their potential to support collaboration, their capability to trigger physical activity and their inherent attractiveness. However, despite their many benefits, few works have considered the use of robots with children aged under 6 years and those which are targeted at these very young children do not fully exploit the technology, since the designed robots are fixed in one spot and do not support collaborative and cooperative instruction. This paper therefore evaluates the usability of a tangible-mediated robot with eighty-six kindergarten children (2 to 6 years old) which was designed for collaborative kindergarten instruction. The results obtained proved the suitability of the proposed platform for children from the age of 3 years and lays the foundation for developing new learning activities based on this technology for early childhood instruction.

Active Creation of Digital Games as Learning Tools

Digital media and software have been used in supporting learning. Activities based on games should place the emphasis on the phase of creating artifacts for the game world, not on just playing or consuming contents. This chapter briefly reviews a number of outstanding efforts on providing advanced systems for the creation of digital games or simulations by children or young users, and analyzes their characteristics in terms of technology and the creation degree offered in both authorship and play processes.