Systematic review on usability of mobile learning applications for children

The accelerated development of new technology, particularly on mobile application has increased teacher’s responsibility as a learning facilitator.Mobile learning application is very useful in enriching the mobile learning experience of children.However, some applications fail to assist and increase children knowledge on the subject they studied.Moreover, some children are not interested in mobile applications due to other issues such as poor interfaces.In this paper, some previous studies on dimensions used to evaluate mobile learning applications were reviewed.The systematic literature review approach was employed to search previous papers and studies on usability dimension, particularly for mobile learning applications.The result showed that the top four usability dimensions are efficiency,effectiveness; learn ability and user satisfaction. This study explored the current literatures on the subject matter and stimulates further studies that will lead to improved usability of mobile learning applications for children

Cellulo: Tangible Haptic Swarm Robots for Learning

Robots are steadily becoming one of the significant 21st century learning technologies that aim to improve education within both formal and informal environments. Such robots, called Robots for Learning, have so far been utilized as constructionist tools or social agents that aided learning from distinct perspectives. This thesis presents a novel approach to Robots for Learning that aims to explore new added values by means of investigating uses for robots in educational scenarios beyond those that are commonly tackled: We develop a platform from scratch to be "as versatile as pen and paper", namely as composed of easy to use objects that feel like they belong in the learning ecosystem while being seamlessly usable across many activities that help teach a variety of subjects. Following this analogy, we design our platform as many low-cost, palm-sized tangible robots that operate on printed paper sheets, controlled by readily available mobile computers such as smartphones or tablets. From the learners' perspective, our robots are thus physical and manipulable points of hands-on interaction with learning activities where they play the role of both abstract and concrete objects that are otherwise not easily represented. We realize our novel platform in four incremental phases, each of which consists of a development stage and multiple subsequent validation stages. First, we develop accurately positioned tangibles, characterize their localization performance and test the learners' interaction with our tangibles in a playful activity. Second, we integrate mobility into our tangibles and make them full-blown robots, characterize their locomotion performance and test the emerging notion of moving vs. being moved in a learning activity. Third, we enable haptic feedback capability on our robots, measure their range of usability and test them within a complete lesson that highlights this newly developed affordance. Fourth, we develop the means of building swarms with our haptic-enabled tangible robots and test the final form of our platform in a lesson co-designed with a teacher. Our effort thus contains the participation of more than 370 child learners over the span of these phases, which leads to the initial insights into this novel Robots for Learning avenue. Besides its main contributions to education, this thesis further contributes to a range of research fields related to our technological developments, such as positioning systems, robotic mechanism design, haptic interfaces and swarm robotics

Haptics: Science, Technology, Applications

This open access book constitutes the proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Human Haptic Sensing and Touch Enabled Computer Applications, EuroHaptics 2022, held in Hamburg, Germany, in May 2022. The 36 regular papers included in this book were carefully reviewed and selected from 129 submissions. They were organized in topical sections as follows: haptic science; haptic technology; and haptic applications

Proceedings of the 9th international conference on disability, virtual reality and associated technologies (ICDVRAT 2012)

The proceedings of the conferenc

The Effectiveness of Robot-Assisted, Task-Specific Ankle Training in Improving Deficits Across the Three Domains of the ICF in Children with Cerebral Palsy (CP)

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI)Cerebral Palsy (CP) is considered to be the leading cause of motor disability among children. Children with CP present with multiple physical impairments including decreased strength and range of motion (ROM), increased spasticity, and poor balance and coordination. These impairments often lead to limitations in ankle motor control that impacts balance and gait function, which puts children at a higher risk for developing other problems. In recent studies, robotic devices have been developed to address poor motor control of the upper and lower extremities. Aim: The aim of this study is to investigate the extent to which the robot-assisted, taskspecific ankle trainer improve deficits across the three domains of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) in children with CP. Method: This is a quasi-experimental, single group, repeated measure design with four time-testing points through a set training session/protocol. A convenience sample of 5 children with CP were enrolled in the study. All children received 6-weeks of ankle robot training that included two 45-60 minute sessions per week, for a total of 12 sessions. Data from Tardieu Scale of spasticity, Boyd and Graham selective motor control, Pediatric Balance Scale, goniometer, hand held dynamometer, gait mat analysis, accelerometer, LIFE-H for children questionnaires, ultrasound, and robotic evaluation were collected at the different time points (1 week and 1 month pre training and 1 week and 1 month post training). Descriptive statistics and repeated measure (ANOVA) were used with SPSS software for data analysis. Results: All participants showed improvement in 1. Body Function and Structures (ROM, tone, strength, balance, ankle control and performance, and muscle architecture), 2. Activity (gait and activity counts) and 3. Participations over the course of the study. Conclusion: The results revealed the potential of robot-assisted, task-specific ankle training to improve motor performance and capacity at the body function, activity and participation level. Training appeared to have a lasting impact as most gains were maintained one month following training

SHELDON Smart habitat for the elderly.

An insightful document concerning active and assisted living under different perspectives: Furniture and habitat, ICT solutions and Healthcare

Touch- and Walkable Virtual Reality to Support Blind and Visually Impaired Peoples‘ Building Exploration in the Context of Orientation and Mobility

Der Zugang zu digitalen Inhalten und Informationen wird immer wichtiger für eine erfolgreiche Teilnahme an der heutigen, zunehmend digitalisierten Zivilgesellschaft. Solche Informationen werden meist visuell präsentiert, was den Zugang für blinde und sehbehinderte Menschen einschränkt. Die grundlegendste Barriere ist oft die elementare Orientierung und Mobilität (und folglich die soziale Mobilität), einschließlich der Erlangung von Kenntnissen über unbekannte Gebäude vor deren Besuch. Um solche Barrieren zu überbrücken, sollten technische Hilfsmittel entwickelt und eingesetzt werden. Es ist ein Kompromiss zwischen technologisch niedrigschwellig zugänglichen und verbreitbaren Hilfsmitteln und interaktiv-adaptiven, aber komplexen Systemen erforderlich. Die Anpassung der Technologie der virtuellen Realität (VR) umfasst ein breites Spektrum an Entwicklungs- und Entscheidungsoptionen. Die Hauptvorteile der VR-Technologie sind die erhöhte Interaktivität, die Aktualisierbarkeit und die Möglichkeit, virtuelle Räume und Modelle als Abbilder von realen Räumen zu erkunden, ohne dass reale Gefahren und die begrenzte Verfügbarkeit von sehenden Helfern auftreten. Virtuelle Objekte und Umgebungen haben jedoch keine physische Beschaffenheit. Ziel dieser Arbeit ist es daher zu erforschen, welche VR-Interaktionsformen sinnvoll sind (d.h. ein angemessenes Verbreitungspotenzial bieten), um virtuelle Repräsentationen realer Gebäude im Kontext von Orientierung und Mobilität berührbar oder begehbar zu machen. Obwohl es bereits inhaltlich und technisch disjunkte Entwicklungen und Evaluationen zur VR-Technologie gibt, fehlt es an empirischer Evidenz. Zusätzlich bietet diese Arbeit einen Überblick über die verschiedenen Interaktionen. Nach einer Betrachtung der menschlichen Physiologie, Hilfsmittel (z.B. taktile Karten) und technologischen Eigenschaften wird der aktuelle Stand der Technik von VR vorgestellt und die Anwendung für blinde und sehbehinderte Nutzer und der Weg dorthin durch die Einführung einer neuartigen Taxonomie diskutiert. Neben der Interaktion selbst werden Merkmale des Nutzers und des Geräts, der Anwendungskontext oder die nutzerzentrierte Entwicklung bzw. Evaluation als Klassifikatoren herangezogen. Begründet und motiviert werden die folgenden Kapitel durch explorative Ansätze, d.h. im Bereich 'small scale' (mit sogenannten Datenhandschuhen) und im Bereich 'large scale' (mit einer avatargesteuerten VR-Fortbewegung). Die folgenden Kapitel führen empirische Studien mit blinden und sehbehinderten Nutzern durch und geben einen formativen Einblick, wie virtuelle Objekte in Reichweite der Hände mit haptischem Feedback erfasst werden können und wie verschiedene Arten der VR-Fortbewegung zur Erkundung virtueller Umgebungen eingesetzt werden können. Daraus werden geräteunabhängige technologische Möglichkeiten und auch Herausforderungen für weitere Verbesserungen abgeleitet. Auf der Grundlage dieser Erkenntnisse kann sich die weitere Forschung auf Aspekte wie die spezifische Gestaltung interaktiver Elemente, zeitlich und räumlich kollaborative Anwendungsszenarien und die Evaluation eines gesamten Anwendungsworkflows (d.h. Scannen der realen Umgebung und virtuelle Erkundung zu Trainingszwecken sowie die Gestaltung der gesamten Anwendung in einer langfristig barrierefreien Weise) konzentrieren.Access to digital content and information is becoming increasingly important for successful participation in today's increasingly digitized civil society. Such information is mostly presented visually, which restricts access for blind and visually impaired people. The most fundamental barrier is often basic orientation and mobility (and consequently, social mobility), including gaining knowledge about unknown buildings before visiting them. To bridge such barriers, technological aids should be developed and deployed. A trade-off is needed between technologically low-threshold accessible and disseminable aids and interactive-adaptive but complex systems. The adaptation of virtual reality (VR) technology spans a wide range of development and decision options. The main benefits of VR technology are increased interactivity, updatability, and the possibility to explore virtual spaces as proxies of real ones without real-world hazards and the limited availability of sighted assistants. However, virtual objects and environments have no physicality. Therefore, this thesis aims to research which VR interaction forms are reasonable (i.e., offering a reasonable dissemination potential) to make virtual representations of real buildings touchable or walkable in the context of orientation and mobility. Although there are already content and technology disjunctive developments and evaluations on VR technology, there is a lack of empirical evidence. Additionally, this thesis provides a survey between different interactions. Having considered the human physiology, assistive media (e.g., tactile maps), and technological characteristics, the current state of the art of VR is introduced, and the application for blind and visually impaired users and the way to get there is discussed by introducing a novel taxonomy. In addition to the interaction itself, characteristics of the user and the device, the application context, or the user-centered development respectively evaluation are used as classifiers. Thus, the following chapters are justified and motivated by explorative approaches, i.e., in the group of 'small scale' (using so-called data gloves) and in the scale of 'large scale' (using an avatar-controlled VR locomotion) approaches. The following chapters conduct empirical studies with blind and visually impaired users and give formative insight into how virtual objects within hands' reach can be grasped using haptic feedback and how different kinds of VR locomotion implementation can be applied to explore virtual environments. Thus, device-independent technological possibilities and also challenges for further improvements are derived. On the basis of this knowledge, subsequent research can be focused on aspects such as the specific design of interactive elements, temporally and spatially collaborative application scenarios, and the evaluation of an entire application workflow (i.e., scanning the real environment and exploring it virtually for training purposes, as well as designing the entire application in a long-term accessible manner)

Remote Touch Communication System for family Communication

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH