Case: Technology vs Dyslexia

I was just reading about how a simple test has been developed for parents to test whether their children have dyslexia. The system is called the Grammar and Phonology Screening (GAPS) and will be sold for £50. Parts of the test require the child to speak into the system to assess their ability to construct words using sounds.

After reading the article I wondered whether we could develop a tool that could help children that have dyslexia.

It also opened my eyes to the idea of targeting a minority group within our target audience i.e. not necessarily every child of a certain age, but perhaps ones with a certain need or requirement.

The article I read can be found here

Case: Child Smart Cards

I just found an interesting article about how Sedgefield Borough Council, in County Durham, are about to launch a new smart card scheme aimed at children. The idea behind the card is that children can build up points both at school and within the community by doing such activities as learning first aid, picking up litter etc. They will also be able to put money on the cards so that they can use them to buy their lunches at school (apparently reducing bullying). Some schools already adopt a similar scheme with great success being reported.

I had a similar idea about making a child smart card a couple of years ago, we can't obviously do that for this project. However, we could think about developing some sort of device that can used in conjunction with these smart cards. If this is a route we decide to go down, someone could find out more about the smart card technology, that the schools are looking to implement, in more detail. We can discuss this further at the next meeting.

Link to the Guardian's article with more information about it can be found here

Case: CBBC's Virtual World

I read today that CBBC have developed a children's version of the virtual world Second Life. Children will be able to create an avatar and roam around a safe environment interacting with different objects and places. The CBBC World will be designed to have zones offering different content, even allowing users to upload their own creations.

What interests me about this article is that it is a good indicator of what can be understood by children and the sorts of technological break throughs that can be achieved by recognising that. Simply - "don't underestimate children". We should not be wary of incorporating any technologies that require the internet or anything similar (the CBBC World is aimed at children between 7 and 12).

Link to the Guardian's article with more information about it can be found here

Admin: Meeting 1

First meeting is scheduled for Monday 29th January at 4-5pm (just before HCI).

As a basic agenda, we should briefly discuss general ideas and perhaps areas of expertise. At this meeting we should also decide the date of the next.

Admin: Weekly Meeting Times

I think it will be good if we can agree on times that we can have meetings. We don't have to make it a regimented timetabled event, but we at least then know the potential times.

From what I know about everyone's timetable, I propose these times:

Mondays before HCI, 4-5pm
Thursdays before C++, 3-4pm

Wednesdays - Russell will be scheduling Wednesday sessions so we'll have to see on that one, but if we meet on Mondays and Thursdays there's very little point meeting on the Wednesday session unless Russell needs us to.

Use the comment tool below to confirm these times.