334,370 research outputs found
”Hide and Tweet”: A game to teach schoolchildren about spatial technologies
As part of the Geotechnology research team at NUI Maynooth we were involved in the preparation
and running of various activities in the Summer School on Computer Science for school children aged between
12 to 18 years old. Since year 2009 we have been constantly developing, testing, and deploying some geospatial
software applications which were used by the children for activities in the summer school programme. The high
level goal of this development was to help school children become more familiar GPS devices and computerbased
Location-based services (LBS) technologies which are now playing such a crucial role in today’s Internet
connected society. The software applications were used as part of games and tasks for the children. In our paper
we shall describe how these games have evolve during these years, the educational aspects and benefits of the
game and how both the software components and devices were developed. Overall, children participating in the
summerschool provided their comments in the form of a survey. They felt that there were now more aware about
possibilities in geoinformatics available with “ordinary off the shelf devices”. Different issues related with webbased
maps (Google Maps, OpenStreetMap, Bing Maps, etc) were introduced and we explained the differences
between them. Most importantly in case of geo-technologies we felt that the activities helped the children become
aware that that computing and positioning happens everywhere and is not tied with the desk and the desktop
computer.We summarise our experiences gained in these last three years and discuss the educational gains of this
type of game-based approach to location-based technologies to schoolchildren. All of our software is developed
using free and open-source components meaning that it can be deployed by any school or educational facility with
minimum cost. A smartphone-based version of the software has also been developed
Evaluation of the game development process of a location-based mobile game
There is a growing interest of government bodies and NGOs in using (serious) video games in awareness campaigns. Until now, however, little was known on how to set up such a campaign so as to effectively cater to the needs of different stakeholders including the target audience. Hence designing, developing and translating a game for educational purposes whilst balancing between fun and learning is a complex process, this paper aims to evaluate this by presenting a methodological framework for involving stakeholders in the design and development of a game-based awareness campaign based on a user-centered software design methodology and assesses its effectiveness in a concrete use case: the development of the location-based mobile game City Jam. The goal was to develop a game-based road safety campaign to confront adolescents with road traffic situations with the aim to positively influence road safety attitude and behavior. Mobile technologies offer new opportunities to embed digital game based learning by in different contexts. Given the nature of the road safety campaign, a location-based game format was chosen, aiming to facilitate learning by means of an extended three-way interaction (human interaction, game and context). Different user-centered design methods were deployed throughout several phases of the game development process: In phase one (the opportunity identification) a literature review was performed to investigate relevant fields for the game’s goal. In phase two (the game concept development) expert interviews and a focus groups were conducted with relevant stakeholders and in phase three (the game concept design) co-design sessions and a focus group resulted in a game design document. In phase four (game development and testing) the beta version of City jam was developed and tested in an iterative field testing design and resulted in the final game. Results obtained throughout the game development process provided us the opportunity to evaluate several major aspects. Firstly the impact of stakeholder involvement on the different phases of the design process and the final product resulted in a game that was tailored to the preferences and needs of the target group. Secondly translating the game concept into practice, such as game elements, proposed educational game elements, were evaluated based on the usability, playability principles and social and technological aspects. Benefits and challenges of user-centered design methods are discussed and how budget constraints and differing desired outcomes of different stakeholders challenge but also enrich the process
Virtual Reality Rhythm Game
Virtual reality headsets such as the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift bring robust virtual reality technology in the hands of consumers. However, virtual reality technology is still a very new and unexplored domain with a dearth of compelling software that takes advantage of what virtual reality has to offer. Current rhythm games on the virtual reality platform lack a sense of immersion for the player. These games also require players to remain stationary during gameplay. Our solution is a game where players have to hit musical notes that appear in a trail around them. The trail will move in different directions and players have to move and turn around accordingly in order to hit every note and pass a song
A case study of MMO2's Madic: A framework for creating mobile internet systems
Mobile Internet applications on ubiquitous mobile networks allows real-time, anywhere, anytime connectivity to services. Due to its scalability and potential cost savings, mobile communication is being increasingly applied in the business and consumer communities to create innovative data and voice application, which run over the Internet infrastructure. This paper reports on a case study at an organisation that created an innovative approach to developing mobile applications developed by third party independent developers. A conceptual wireless reference model is presented that was used to define the various system components required to create effective mobile applications
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Education in the Wild: Contextual and Location-Based Mobile Learning in Action. A Report from the STELLAR Alpine Rendez-Vous Workshop Series
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Prototyping a Context-Aware Framework for Pervasive Entertainment Applications
Framework for the implementation of urban big screens in the public space
In the last decade, big urban screens have appeared in town squares and on building facades across the UK. The use of these screens brings new potentials and challenges for city regulators, artists, architects, urban designers, producers, broadcasters and advertisers. Dynamic moving images form new architectural material, affecting our perception and the experience of the space around us. A new form of urban space is emerging that is fundamentally different from what we have known, and it seems that we are
ill-equipped to deal with and analyse it.
We are just beginning to understand the opportunities for public information, art and community engagement. Most of screens at present serve mainly commercial purposes, they do not broadcast information aimed at sharing community content nor do they support public social interactions. We
need to see more negotiation between commercial, public and cultural interests. The SCREAM project addresses these new challenges by looking at the physical urban spaces and the potential spaces created by the new technologies
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Introduction to location-based mobile learning
[About the book]
The report follows on from a 2-day workshop funded by the STELLAR Network of Excellence as part of their 2009 Alpine Rendez-Vous workshop series and is edited by Elizabeth Brown with a foreword from Mike Sharples. Contributors have provided examples of innovative and exciting research projects and practical applications for mobile learning in a location-sensitive setting, including the sharing of good practice and the key findings that have resulted from this work. There is also a debate about whether location-based and contextual learning results in shallower learning strategies and a section detailing the future challenges for location-based learning
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