Rethinking 'multi-user': an in-the-wild study of how groups approach a walk-up-and-use tabletop interface

Multi-touch tabletops have been much heralded as an innovative technology that can facilitate new ways of group working. However, there is little evidence of these materialising outside of research lab settings. We present the findings of a 5-week in-the-wild study examining how a shared planning application – designed to run on a walk-up- and-use tabletop – was used when placed in a tourist information centre. We describe how groups approached, congregated and interacted with it and the social interactions that took place – noting how they were quite different from research findings describing the ways groups work around a tabletop in lab settings. We discuss the implications of such situated group work for designing collaborative tabletop applications for use in public settings

Evocative computing – creating meaningful lasting experiences in connecting with the past

We present an approach – evocative computing – that demonstrates how ‘at hand’ technologies can be ‘picked up’ and used by people to create meaningful and lasting experiences, through connecting and interacting with the past. The approach is instantiated here through a suite of interactive technologies configured for an indoor-outdoor setting that enables groups to explore, discover and research the history and background of a public cemetery. We report on a two-part study where different groups visited the cemetery and interacted with the digital tools and resources. During their activities serendipitous uses of the technology led to connections being made between personal memo-ries and ongoing activities. Furthermore, these experiences were found to be long-lasting; a follow-up study, one year later, showed them to be highly memorable, and in some cases leading participants to take up new directions in their work. We discuss the value of evocative computing for enriching user experiences and engagement with heritage practices

Learning by doing with shareable interfaces

New technologies, such as multi-touch tables, increasingly provide shareable interfaces where multiple people can simultaneously interact, enabling co-located groups to collaborate more flexibly than using single personal computers. Soon, these technologies will make their way into the classroom. However, little is known about what kinds of learning activities they will effectively support that other technologies, such as mobile devices, whiteboards, and personal computers, are currently unable to do. We suggest that one of the most promising uses of shareable interfaces is to support learning through exploration and creation. We present our work on DigiTile as a case study of how shareable interfaces can enable these forms of learning by doing. We demonstrate how DigiTile supports collaboration, present a field study on its learning benefits, and show how it can fit into a larger computing ecology

Designing tabletop applications for collaboration in non-collaborative learning tasks in the classroom : learning persuasive writing

PhD ThesisLearning in a face to face collaborative setting can have many benefits, such as leveraging differing peer proficiency to obtain an outcome not reachable by the individuals involved. Including expertise provided by teachers decreases this gap between potential and current ability, while also providing opportunity for the expert to impart timely and appropriate assistance to the learners. In the fields of Human Computer Interaction and Educational Technology, digital tabletops have come to the fore as a medium for facilitating small groups of collaborative learners, and suitable applications can provide at least some of the support that the teacher’s expertise would in the learning process. Previously, most explorations in this area have concentrated on learning tasks that are already collaborative in nature, and have focused on single group deployments, and usually in controlled settings such as a research lab. This thesis focuses on two main aims: (i) investigating the design of such applications, and how learning tasks not normally considered collaborative, such as Persuasive Extended Writing, might be adapted to a digital tabletop mediated collaborative learning task; and (ii), how to expand this application from a single group to a classroom scenario, and overcoming all the challenges that an “in the wild” deployment of this kind might entail. A review of previous literature on collaborative learning and collaborative learning technology inform a learner centred design process of an application for the collaborative learning of Persuasive Extended Writing. This design process was conducted with three groups of three learners aged 13 – 15 in the lab. Based on this investigation of the literature around collaborative learning, there is a potential learning impact from allowing collaboration in a usually non-collaborative learning setting. The application incorporates factors designed to elicit collaborative behaviours, such as visuospatial representations and decision points. The work then sets about identifying and evaluating these collaborative behaviours, with a view that they are potentially in line with this ultimate learning goal. iii The Collocated Collaborative Writing application (CCW) is deployed and evaluated in an “in the wild” classroom setting. This involved two studies in real classrooms in schools, with eight digital tabletops allowing for a class-wide deployment. In the first study, participants were students of mixed ability, year 8 (aged 13-14), studying English, Geography and History. In the second study, participants were mixed ability year 8 students (aged 13-14) studying English. Studies were facilitated by teachers who had created the material for the studies based on their current teaching and curriculum. The process identified the issues and challenges involved in this kind of “in the wild” deployment. The lessons learned from this process about the differing expectations of the stakeholders involved in the first study informed the second deployment. A combination of addressing the issues directly, forming a more equal partnership with the school and teacher, and differences in culture between the schools lead to a study in which the collaborative writing application is evaluated. There are two main contributions of this work. Firstly, a set of design guidelines derived from lessons learned during the design process. Their intention is to assist in the process of making a normally non-collaborative learning task into a collaborative one, by exploiting affordances of the technology. The second contribution comes from lessons learned from two “in the wild” classroom studies. It outlines a deeper understanding of how this kind of application can be extended to the classroom by gaining insight into expectations of the parties involved, understanding the culture of the school and making the process a partnership rather than an imposition. The work also evaluated the Collaborative Writing Application in terms of the type and quality of the collaborative behaviours of the participants, and how they changed over time, as well as the adoption of the technology by the teacher, eventually being seen as a tool for their own agenda rather than an external element in the classroom

An in-the-wild study of learning to brainstorm: Comparing cards, tabletops and wall displays in the classroom

© 2016 The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The British Computer Society. Single display interactive groupware interfaces have the potential to effectively support small group work in classrooms. Our work aimed to gain understanding needed to realize that potential. First, we wanted to study how learners use these large interactive displays, compared with a more traditional method within classrooms. Second, we wanted to fill gaps in the current understanding of the effectiveness of interactive tables versus walls. Third, we wanted to do this out of the laboratory setting, in authentic classrooms, with their associated constraints. We conducted an in-the-wild study, with 51 design students, working in 14 groups, learning the brainstorming technique. Each group practiced brainstorming in three classrooms: one with vertical displays (walls); another with multi-touch tabletops; and the third with pens and index cards. The published literature suggested that tabletops would be better than the other conditions for key factors of cooperative participation, mutual awareness, maintaining interest and affective measures. Contrary to this, we found that the horizontal and vertical displays both had similar levels of benefit over the conventional method. It was only for affective measures that tabletops were better than walls. All conditions were similar for our several measures of outcome quality. We discuss the implications of our findings for designing future classrooms

RFID interactive tabletop application with tangible objects: exploratory study to observe young children’ behaviors

International audienceNumerous academic and industrial studies and developments concerning interactive tabletops are paving the way for new educational applications. We have developed an interactive tabletop application equipped with RFID technology. This tabletop, called TangiSense, is based on a Multi-Agent System that allows users to associate information with behaviors to manipulate tangible objects. The application involves the recognition of basic colors. With the application, children are required to manipulate tangible objects. Their task involves recognizing objects that have "lost" their dominant color and placing these objects in appropriate colored areas. A tangible magician object automatically analyzes the filled zones and provides children and their teacher with virtual and vocal feedback. This application has been evaluated in a field study with children 3 to 5 years of age. The initial results are promising and show that such an application can support interaction and collaboration, and subsequently educational situations, among young children

Nothing Like a Good Fiasco! Exploring the Potential of Tabletop Role-Playing Games (TRPGs) As Literacy Experiences

Within this position paper, we describe the use of Fiasco, a tabletop role-playing game (TRPG), as it relates to the creation of literacy experiences. Fiasco is a TRPG that utilizes prompts inspired by genre fiction to collaboratively generate, establish, and resolve scenes between a varied cast of characters in several rounds improvisational roleplay. To explore the range of literacy experience opportunities, present in its play, we present our experiences designing and playing a Fiasco session and reflect upon the transformative potential of tabletop games in creating literacy experiences. The position we undertake, in favor of the considered use of TRPGs for learning through serious gaming in classrooms, is reflective of the experiences within our local gaming and learning communities. Based upon this experience and relevant literature, we contend that table-top gaming fits well within literacy pedagogy and explore how they can be used in classrooms. Therefore, our discussion is centered upon the potential of tabletop games experiences to be considered inventive, specifically in relation to the teaching and learning of literacy skills within a serious gaming framework

Collaborating around digital tabletops: children’s physical strategies from the UK, India and Finland

We present a study of children collaborating around interactive tabletops in three different countries: the United Kingdom, India and Finland. Our data highlights the key distinctive physical strategies used by children when performing collaborative tasks during this study. Children in the UK tend to prefer static positioning with minimal physical contact and simultaneous object movement. Children in India employed dynamic positioning with frequent physical contact and simultaneous object movement. Children in Finland used a mixture of dynamic and static positioning with minimal physical contact and object movement. Our findings indicate the importance of understanding collaboration strategies and behaviours when designing and deploying interactive tabletops in heterogeneous educational environments. We conclude with a discussion on how designers of tabletops for schools can provide opportunities for children in different countries to define and shape their own collaboration strategies for small group learning that take into account their different classroom practices

Entry and access : how shareability comes about

Shareability is a design principle that refers to how a system, interface, or device engages a group of collocated, co-present users in shared interactions around the same content (or the same object). This is broken down in terms of a set of components that facilitate or constrain the way an interface (or product) is made shareable. Central are the notions of access points and entry points. Entry points invite and entice people into engagement, providing an advance overview, minimal barriers, and a honeypot effect that draws observers into the activity. Access points enable users to join a group's activity, allowing perceptual and manipulative access and fluidity of sharing. We show how these terms can be useful for informing analysis and empirical research

Utilisation d'une Table Interactive avec objets Tangibles pour apprendre à l'école : études empiriques en milieu écologique

International audienceWe describe in this article the results of three-years study of using a Tangible Tabletop Interface (TTI) for the development of student learning in spatial reasoning abilities. In partnership with the French Department of Education and teachers, we have designed and built a serious game in mathematics, called The Game of Towers for the TangiSense 2 interactive tabletop. Then, we conducted « in the wild » experiments with 68 students. As part of a first study, we compared the learning outcomes of two groups of students (Gr. Traditional vs. Gr. TTI). The results of this study have encouraged us to make a second experiment. In the latter, we analyzed child participation (physical and verbal) and the social modes of knowledge co-construction when they played the game on the TTI. The results showed that students improved their performance by playing the game on the TTI and collaborated through externalization and conflict-oriented consensus.Nous décrivons dans cet article, les résultats de trois années d’études sur l’utilisation d’une Table Interactive avec objets Tangibles (TIT) pour le développement des capacités de raisonnement spatial d’élèves de Cours Préparatoire (CP). Pour cela nous avons, avec l’aide d’enseignants et d’une conseillère pédagogique, conçu et développé le Jeu des Tours pour la table interactive TangiSense 2. Nous avons ensuite mené des expérimentations en milieu écologique avec 68 élèves. Dans le cadre d’une première étude, nous avons comparé les résultats d’apprentissage de deux groupes d’élèves (Gr. Traditionnel vs. Gr. TIT). Les résultats de cette étude nous ont encouragé à en réaliser une seconde. Dans cette dernière, nous avons analysé la participation des élèves (physique et verbale) et la manière dont ils construisaient leurs connaissances en groupe lorsqu’ils jouaient au Jeu des Tours sur la TIT. Les résultats ont montré que les élèves amélioraient leurs performances en jouant sur la TIT et, collaboraient à travers l’externalisation et la recherche d’un consensus orienté par le conflit