Nagarajan Akshay

Design and evaluation of a Haptic simulator for vocational skill Training and Assessment

While mainstream haptics has been focusing on training elite skills, the haptic simulator described in this paper addresses a problem with a phenomenal social impact that addresses teaching of vocational skills to the growing unskilled and impoverished populations in India. This is an unconventional attempt at designing a multi-tool haptic trainer that could potentially replace traditional training tools and materials in the primary stages of vocational skill training. After an exhaustive analysis of all the tools used in the various vocational trades of the construction industry, we categorized and sorted the tools based on their properties and functions. Using this information, we designed Amrita Progressive Training Assistance using Haptic simulation (APTAH), a cost effective haptic simulator that can train the use of over nineteen hand-held and powered tools used in several vocations. The simulator provides audio, visual and haptic cues that can help the novice master the use of the tools in the absence of a human trainer. This paper also discusses the preliminary trials conducted to study training effectiveness of the haptic simulator proposed.

TryStrokes: Learning on a digital canvas to paint in the real world

In rural and tribal communities, producing handicrafts act as a source of supplementary income and a means to preserve the uniqueness of their arts and craft forms. Developing skills requires practise and knowledge of native techniques. In activities such as painting, skill in application of pressure and tilt of the brush are very important parameters that contribute to creating beautiful artwork. Technology can play a vital role in aiding to preserve traditional techniques and skills. In this paper we discuss the design of a software application that contains a skill database that stores expert brush stroke techniques and help the novice learn to apply the brush strokes by providing feedback based on the expert stroke. This computerised training solution is scalable, portable and cost effective.

MoVE: Mobile vocational education for rural India

The aim of this paper is to present the design of a project that involves deployment of computerized vocational training courses comprised of multimedia enhanced video lectures, virtual reality games and low cost haptic device based simulations built on mobile-learning platforms and delivered using automobile units. These mobile vocational education units are developed as a model to make vocational education and training more accessible to the rural and tribal populations of India. The paper gives an overview of the design of the mobile vocational education units and details the architecture and communication interface for the m-learning application. It further describes the software architecture of the vocational education application that is specifically designed to easily scale across various vocational trades and languages of delivery, provide flexibility and increase accessibility for vocational training.

Bridging the skill gap using vocational training simulators: Validating skill assessment metrics

Skill development continues to remain a daunting task, especially in developing countries, owing to the numerous challenges posed by resource constraints such as unavailability of certified expert trainers and lack of tools to measure and quantify human motor skill learning. Attempts are being made to address these problems by introducing technology enhanced learning systems. The APTAH haptic simulator is one such solution that addresses the need for guided instruction, constant monitoring and support in vocational skill training. Each training session using APTAH generates data that needs to be verified for its reliability in revealing relevant information that can support measurements on the trainees actual learning and progress. The paper presents the experiments performed on simulator generated data, in order to examine the existence and strength of fundamental dependencies among the skill parameters involved. The regression methods used in the analysis demonstrate that the device is capable in capturing many vital relationships that exist between the skill parameters such that it can later be used in enhancing skill learning of the trainee.

Do It Yourself Educational Kits for Vocational Education and Training

Human motor skill training forms a large portion of the curriculum for any vocational education and training course. Construction personnel such as carpenters, plumbers and masons require long hours of training in order to gain expertise and workmanship to perform complex tasks skillfully. Poor skill in the use of tools results in sub-optimal outcome; compromised work quality and consumes additional cost. In this paper, we describe the design of a novel do-it-yourself educational tool that is built using low cost materials, open source software and hardware, the designs for which are freely downloadable. This educational toolkit uses haptic technology to augment the need for realism and is used to provide skill training in the use of vocational tools. The aim is to generate interest in vocational education and to provide greater accessibility for base level skill training.

Learning Elementary Physics though Haptic Simulations

Because many concepts in physics are non-engaging and difficult to understand, instructors in physics are challenged to fully engage students in the study of physics. For even the best students, current practices are not fully engaging and do not provide a deep understanding of fundamental principles. While traditional laboratory exercises are a good way to support and reinforce learning, haptic simulations can be more effective. Haptic feedback can increase understanding within a virtual environment in certain instances and can provide an additional modality for imparting tangible principles. In this paper, we discuss the design of an educational simulation tool using audio, visual and haptic feedback for learning basic concepts in physics at the elementary school student level.

Augmented vocational tools using real time audiovisual feedback for psychomotor skill training

This paper presents the concept design of SMART (Skill Mentoring and Assistance in Real Time), a novel motion monitoring and audio-visual feedback device for the students in Vocational Education and Training (VET) to assist in minimizing and in correcting the errors in the use of occupational tools. SMART is easily attached to any vocational tool and can guide the user to conform to specific spatiotemporal trajectories and orientation as described by template shape. The paper provides a description of the low cost accelerometer, gyroscopes and an input interface that are integrated with the micro controller and proposes an algorithm to provide such guidance for the tool.

Aim for the sky: Fostering a Constructionist Learning Environment for Teaching Maker Skills to Children in India

The education system in schools in India at large focuses on the transmission of knowledge to students and sets the expectation to simply memorize and reproduce it on tests in the form it was originally taught to them. In order to lay the ground for teaching 21st-century skills, it is imperative to go beyond the confines of the textbook and lecture-based learning and to encourage applying the knowledge imparted in the classroom in creative contexts and to solve problems. The paper discusses the workshop conducted to teach maker skills in the context of STEM-based learning to eighth graders in a semi-urban school in India. The students were taught to work with tools and the principles of design and the science required to create and launch water rockets. Pre-workshop and post-workshop surveys were conducted to measure for change in intrinsic motivation and general self-efficacy of the students who participated in the making activity. The results reveal a reported significant reduction in performance related tension and pressure after participating in such collaborative activities among other findings that are discussed in detail in the paper.

Control of quadrotors using neural networks for precise landing maneuvers

Aerial and ground robots have been widely used in tandem to overcome the limitations of the individual systems, such as short run time and limited field of view. Several strategies have been proposed for this collaboration and all of them involve periodic autonomous precision landing of the aerial vehicle on the ground robot for recharging. Intelligent control systems like neural networks lend themselves naturally to precision landing applications since they offer immunity to system dynamics and adaptability to various environments. Our work describes an offline neural network backpropagation controller to provide visual servoing for the landing operation. The quadrotor control system is designed to perform precise landing on a marker platform within the specified time and distance constraints. The proposed method has been simulated and validated in a Gazebo and robot operating system simulation environment.