Embodiment and embodied design

Picture this. A preverbal infant straddles the center of a seesaw. She gently tilts her weight back and forth from one side to the other, sensing as each side tips downward and then back up again. This child cannot articulate her observations in simple words, let alone in scientific jargon. Can she learn anything from this experience? If so, what is she learning, and what role might such learning play in her future interactions in the world? Of course, this is a nonverbal bodily experience, and any learning that occurs must be bodily, physical learning. But does this nonverbal bodily experience have anything to do with the sort of learning that takes place in schools - learning verbal and abstract concepts? In this chapter, we argue that the body has everything to do with learning, even learning of abstract concepts. Take mathematics, for example. Mathematical practice is thought to be about producing and manipulating arbitrary symbolic inscriptions that bear abstract, universal truisms untainted by human corporeality. Mathematics is thought to epitomize our species’ collective historical achievement of transcending and, perhaps, escaping the mundane, material condition of having a body governed by haphazard terrestrial circumstance. Surely mathematics is disembodied

Continuity in cognition

Designing for continuous interaction requires designers to consider the way in which human users can perceive and evaluate an artefact’s observable behaviour, in order to make inferences about its state and plan, and execute their own continuous behaviour. Understanding the human point of view in continuous interaction requires an understanding of human causal reasoning, of the way in which humans perceive and structure the world, and of human cognition. We present a framework for representing human cognition, and show briefly how it relates to the analysis of structure in continuous interaction, and the ways in which it may be applied in design

An evaluation of constructivism for learners with ADHD: Development of a constructivist pedagogy for special needs

We examine whether constructivist eLearning tools can be used to help learners cope with special educational needs, such as difficulties with attention and concentration. Preliminary work is reported here, in which we seek to determine the reasons why a constructivist approach is difficult for learners with ADHD. This work is intended to lead to recommendations of how learners with ADHD could benefit from constructivist eLearning systems, e.g. through the managed use of multimedia technology. A preliminary model has been developed that illustrates the areas in which constructivist pedagogies need to address the limitations of ADHD learners. Further work will expand this model and eventually test it in a real environment (e.g. in a school with ADHD learners). The outcome will encourage a reconsideration of existing multimedia theories as they relate to learners with special needs, and provide new directions in order to support learners with ADHD

Towards a theory of software engineering

A theory of software engineering (SE) is presented and its application to explaining and analysing SE situations is illustrated. The theory is based on a characterization of SE representations and the fundamental activities that are applied to them. Motivations for developing a theory and means of establishing its validity are also discussed