Magnus Moar

‘Ere Be Dragons: heartfelt gaming

Abstract A new pervasive digital game is discussed, relating technical and conceptual innovation. A combination of sensor technologies enables a responsive visual and auditory environment to be overlaid on the real world. This allows processes within the players body to be mapped to the environment through which the player passes, externalising the internal. Rather than using technology to replicate the rigid goals and structures of many conventional games, this game explores the concept of ‘open play’, a form of personal exploration. The work is an interdisciplinary collaboration between digital artists and health scientists with an agenda to alter players’attitudes to the body and health as well as to break new ground artistically.

The Vertex Project: Children Creating and Populating 3D Virtual Worlds

This paper outlines early investigations and initial outcomes of The Vertex Project, a school-based action research project currently underway at Middlesex University. The project aims to explore the potential of Shared 3D Virtual Environments as creative learning tools for children, and looks into the challenges facing their practical integration into the primary classroom. Working in partnership with three primary schools, the project sets out to investigate the teaching and learning possibilities offered by Internet based 3D virtual environments, placing particular emphasis on the opportunities provided by the active participation of children in the design and construction of their own virtual worlds, and in the creation of avatars with which to represent themselves within these spaces.

The Vertex project: exploring the creative use of shared 3D virtual worlds in the primary (K-12) classroom

Children invent imaginary worlds and enact scenarios within them on a daily basis as part of their imaginative play. Given the opportunity and the tools, what kind of worlds would children create for themselves within a virtual space, and what kind of learning can emerge within these playful, child-centered spaces? In VERTEX, young children inhabit an imaginary virtual world that they have designed and created using 3D modeling tools and net-based virtual worlds software. Crossing traditional subject disciplines and involving local and remote collaboration, the project demonstrates childrens design and communication abilities above and beyond the expectations of the curriculum.

'Ere be dragons: an interactive artwork

The paper introduces a pervasive digital artwork which harnesses live heart-rate and GPS data to create a novel experience on a Pocket PC. The aims of the project, the technologies employed and the results of a preliminary trial are briefly described.

Do challenge, task experience or computer familiarity influence the learning of historical chronology from virtual environments in 8-9 year old children?

Studies examined the potential use of VEs in teaching historical chronology to 127 children of primary school age (8-9 years). The use of passive fly-through VEs had been found, in an earlier study, to be disadvantageous with this age group when tested for their subsequent ability to place displayed sequential events in correct chronological order. All VEs in the present studies included active challenge, previously shown to enhance learning in older participants. Primary school children in the UK (all frequent computer users) were tested using UK historical materials, but no significant effect was found between three conditions (Paper, PowerPoint and VE) with minimal pre-training. However, excellent (error free) learning occurred when children were allowed greater exploration prior to training in the VE. In Ukraine, with children having much less computer familiarity, training in a VE (depicting Ukrainian history) produced better learning compared to PowerPoint, but no better than in a Paper condition. The results confirmed the benefit of using challenge in a VE with primary age children, but only with adequate prior familiarisation with the medium. Familiarity may reduce working memory load and increase childrens spatial memory capacity for acquiring sequential temporal-spatial information from virtual displays.

Locating Drama: A Demonstration of Location-Aware Audio Drama

Locating Drama is a collaborative project between the Lansdown Centre for Electronic Arts at Middlesex University and the BBC Radio Drama department. The aim of the project is to investigate narrative strategies that utilise locative technologies, principally GPS enabled devices, without being tied to a specific location, allowing listeners to experience immersive, location-aware (but non-location-specific) dramas in suitable locations near their homes, which may eventually be downloaded as interactive pod-casts from the BBC website. The demonstration will present a working drama originally produced for the BBCs Free Thinking festival 2008.

The VERTEX project: designing and populating shared 3D virtual worlds in the primary (elementary) classroom

Abstract Children invent imaginary worlds and enact scenarios within them as part of their everyday play. Given the opportunity and the tools, what kind of worlds could children make for themselves within a virtual space, and what kind of learning can emerge within these playful, child-centred spaces? In VERTEX, young children have designed and created an imaginary virtual world using 3D modelling tools and internet-based virtual worlds software. Crossing traditional subject disciplines and involving local and remote collaboration, the project demonstrates childrens design and communication abilities above and beyond the expectations of the primary curriculum.

The amateur creator

Important design problems are raised in developing software for amateur users, a group distinguished here from novices. The authors argue that these design problems can be approached by understanding how systems for amateurs are derived from those for skilled users, through a combination of transformations we describe as foregrounding, backgrounding, automation, integration and constraining. Useful comparisons are offered with popular product designs. A broader, partly historical, context is then described in which media technologies propagate from use by specialists to use by these amateurs, and the latter change from consumers to creators. The discussion is focused by a description of difficulties with existing software encountered in the course of a creative schools-based project, intended to enable young users both to explore virtual worlds and to design and populate them with their own avatars. The authors argue that HCI design would benefit from a clearer grasp of the special characteristics of designing for amateur users and of transforming existing software for their use.

Can multiple spatial virtual timelines convey the relatedness of chronological knowledge across parallel domains

Single linear virtual timelines have been used effectively with undergraduates and primary school children to convey the chronological ordering of historical items, improving on PowerPoint and paper/textual displays. In the present study, a virtual environment (VE) consisting of three parallel related timelines (world history and the histories of art and psychology) was used to convey both chronology and the cross-referencing and relatedness among the three domains of material. Undergraduate participants were able to use the VE more effectively than booklets, better remembering the chronological ordering of all materials and successfully cross-referencing from one domain to another. The paradigm arguably invokes the use of high capacity spatial memory, and could potentially be used to convey and remember large amounts of historical-chronological information.

Children's creation of shared 3D worlds

This chapter describes research undertaken to investigate how children can be assisted to construct Web-based 3D worlds.As new technologies become an increasingly important part of children’s lives, we need to explore how such technologies can support childrens learning in ways that are stimulating and meaningful. Our previous research has investigated how children in primary schools can become producers as well as users of computer-based systems, and have looked at their construction of multimedia and their use of Internet connectivity. Building on this work, we have been investigating children’s use of shared 3D Web spaces. Using ActiveWorldsTM (AW) technology, we have been helping and observing children from different schools in synchronously navigating, creating and communicating in virtual worlds. We have extended the functionality of AW by creating a simple building tool using C-based Bot and CGI technologies. We have also added to the communications facilities of AW by integrating HearMeTM voice chat technology. The chapter concludes with our plans to enhance children’s experience of AW still further.