Sandra P. Cano

Model for Analysis of Serious Games for Literacy in Deaf Children from a User Experience Approach

Learning to read and write, or acquiring skills in literacy, is a basic educational need. Deaf children traditionally face greater challenges and encounter difficulties particular to their abilities. Their inclusion today in regular schooling places much responsibility for their success on the support teachers designated to provide them with the assistance they need. More and more however, ICT is being used in the field of education. Video Games offer a first class option for generating meaningful learning experiences, and serious games in particular are employed in class to motivate learning. The design of serious games to meet the needs of teachers where deaf children are struggling to master literacy would therefore seem to offer a hugely important contribution. Based on the User Experience approach, a model is therefore put forward for the design of such a serious game. The model assesses the quality of the game and the user experience from others proposed games and examines the aspects that are important for creating a game in this case that can help teachers as support for the learning of both deaf and hearing children in the acquisition of reading and writing skills.

Agile Software Development Process Applied to the Serious Games Development for Children from 7 to 10 Years Old

The development of video games is a complex, multidisciplinary process, which involves different areas as well as a greater number of roles than for traditional software. Serious games face process constraints that concern a number of interactive, educational and psychological factors designed to lead to the fulfillment of educational objectives within a specific context. Based on a case study in the city Cali, Colombia, an iterative and incremental process is proposed, focusing on small and medium development for educational serious games and basing itself on two lines of research: agile development methodology and user-centered design UCD for children from 7 to 10 years. The agile methodology eXtreme Programming XP offers a useful option for the development of serious games as it establishes a continuous communication with all project stakeholders-including the end user-throughout the project, while UCD allows the user profile to be known and identified so that the game will meet the needs and match the capabilities, expectations and motivations of the child.

Toward a methodology for serious games design for children with auditory impairments

The design of a serious game depends on number of factors, including collaboration between different actors, context of use, user profile, and game mechanics. This article presents a methodology for the design of serious games for children with hearing impairments, using a Human Interaction Computer (HCI) approach. The proposed methodology has been applied in a study case for children with hearing impairments in the USAER program in Aguascalientes, Mexico, where the experience of children using the ABC- Spanish game in literacy learning is evaluated. The results obtained on evaluating user experience help o identify aspects in the game mechanics, such as the most appropriate device, continuous feedback, challenges, scoring system, and learning levels. Based on an analysis of requirements, user needs are identified in an educational context incorporating a learning style called Fitzgerald Keys. A heuristics set forms a validation model that allows the level of accomplishment of pedagogical objectives of the prototype game to be assessed. The results are positive. The questionnaire responses produced a high score of 80% indicating success in identifying features to be improved and integrated in the methodology.

Model Based on Learning Needs of Children with Auditory Impairment

This paper presents a model based on the needs of children with an auditory impairment, in which the dual research lines of Human Computer Interaction and Artificial Intelligence are employed in the design of intelligent interactive systems able to meet the requirements of the user. In following a philosophy of user-centered design, different characteristics of children with hearing disabilities are identified, along with AI techniques that could be applied in the model. The main issues involved in designing a user profile and the techniques used in order to create the process of adapting the system to the user are also discussed.

Assessing User Experience for Serious Games in Auditory-Verbal Therapy for Children with Cochlear Implant

Information technology is transforming different areas, such as rehabilitation, in such a way that serious games are finding a use as an alternative in hearing therapies for children with cochlear implants, creating a motivating experience in children. As a result, the design of products for children depends on the skills they have to interact, because if they have a better experience they may have a better learning experience. Most existing methods of assessment are aimed at adults, although some have been adapted for children with special needs, including children with cochlear implants. This article presents a methodology that provides support for following the necessary guidelines and choosing techniques adapted to the characteristics of the child. The methodology has been applied in the cases of 12 children with cochlear implants, where different methods have been used to assess user experience.

Towards the Design of Interactive Storytelling to Support Literacy Teaching for Deaf Children

Poor literacy has created barriers to the education of deaf children in all areas of knowledge. These children face literacy issues mainly due to a late acquisition of their first language. In Colombia, Act 324/1996 and 982/2005 recognizes the CSL (Colombian Sign Language) or LSC for its acronym in Spanish as the official language for deaf community and written Spanish (or oral when possible) as their second language. This study describes an attempt to address the challenge of developing reading and writing skills as a second language for deaf children based on storytelling. A case study is carried out with four deaf children of La Pamba School in Popayan-Colombia following the philosophy of User-Centered Design (UCD) to analyze different aspects of the children like behavior, interests, and teaching strategies, among others, which will be used for the interactive design in the creation of stories through a game.

Design of an Interactive System for teaching Deaf Children Vowels

Children with hearing impairments have barriers to the development of their oral skills. Different systems are used for communication, such as sign language and fingerspelling language. The latter supports literacy teaching to deaf children, who may have difficulties in the learning process in specialized institutes, and, most commonly, in regular schools. This paper evidences the need to propose new mechanisms to support the teaching process. Technology presents a potential solution for this problem. The paper presents the design of an interactive system (video game), which can serve as support for the process of teaching vowels to deaf children between 4 and 8 years.

Augmentative and Alternative Communication in the Literacy Teaching for Deaf Children

Deaf children face various challenges in their daily life in the social, cultural and educational ambits. Therefore they must learn to communicate with society through writing and reading. However learn read and writing without sounds are major challenges, because the teacher must find another learning strategies as communication boards. Taking in account previous works, we propose a communication board for deaf children using the teaching method Fitzgerald Key’s, which we make use of a physic board and technology as an alternative that the child can interact in a real environment and virtual using physic elements and augmented reality.

Proposal of a model for the analysis of requirements and activities for the design of interactive experiences aimed at the psychomotor rehabilitation of children with hearing impairments

To1 design interactive experiences for rehabilitation, we need to identify previously the variables to take into account in the design and development. Therefore, the aim of this work is to propose a model to help in the gathering of appropriate information previous to the design of interactive systems for psychomotor therapies for children with hearing impairments. We followed the User Centered Design (UCD) and the Theory of activity to support the design of satisfying and efficient rehabilitation interactive experiences for people with hearing impairments.

Collaborative learning as educational strategy for deaf children: a systematic literature review

The education of people with disabilities requires special attention and the use of teaching and learning strategies that can be adapted to every particular disability. This study focuses on the education of deaf children as part of a larger project that aims to mix teaching strategies like Logogenia and Fitzgerald Key with interactive storytelling and collaborative learning to support literacy teaching to these children. Since deaf people learn using the visual channel as main input, we believe that technology could play a key role in the development of such environments where user interfaces should be specifically designed to attract childrens attention. We conducted a systematic literature review in order to find what researchers have done to apply Collaborative or Cooperative Learning in the education of deaf children and also what kind of emerging technologies are used to enhance collaborative environments. A total of 229 studies were found in 7 different databases. The results of this study show that Collaborative Learning has been used along with different kinds of technology in the education of deaf people with positive outcomes like improving skills in sign language, literacy and communication.