This paper suggests a framework for understanding the roles that children can play in the technology design process, particularly in regards to designing technologies that support learning. Each role, user, tester, informant and design partner has been defined based upon a review of the literature and the author's own laboratory research experiences. This discussion does not suggest that any one role is appropriate for all research or development needs. Instead, by understanding this framework the reader may be able to make more informed decisions about the design processes they choose to use with children in creating new technologies. This paper will present for each role a historical overview, research and development methods, as well as the strengths, challenges and unique contributions associated with children in the design process.
#1Allison Druin(KTH: Royal Institute of Technology)H-Index: 59
#2Carina Fast(KTH: Royal Institute of Technology)H-Index: 3
From Autumn 1998 to Spring 2001, 27 Swedish children (14, at age 5 and 13, at age 7) partnered with an interdisciplinary and international group of researchers supported by a grant from the European Union to create new storytelling technologies for children. After each of the many design activities, children were asked to reflect with drawings and/or writing in a bound paper journal. As the project concluded in the third year, the children's journals were analyzed and four constructs emerged fro...
Apr 20, 2002 in CHI (Human Factors in Computing Systems)
#1Jaime Montemayor(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 10
#2Allison Druin(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 59
Last. Allison D'Amour(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 1
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Physical interactive environments can come in many forms: museum installations, amusement parks, experimental theaters, and more. Programming these environments has historically been done by adults, and children, as the visiting participants, have been offered few pre-created choices to explore. Given these creative limitations, the goal of our research has been to develop programming tools for physical interactive environments that are appropriate for use by young children (ages 4-6). We have e...
#1Glenda Revelle(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 16
#2Allison Druin(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 59
Last. Lisa Sherman(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 8
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This paper reports on the development of a visual search interface (called “SearchKids”) to support children ages 5–10 years in their efforts to find animals in a hierarchical information structure. This search tool presents both the querying process and its results graphically. The quantitative study reported here focused on two questions: (1) Can children understand and use a visual hierarchical domain structure to find particular instances of animals? (2) Can children construct search queries...
Last. Stacy Weng(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 3
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ABSTRACT As more information resources become accessible using computers, our digital interfaces to those resources need to be appropriate for all people. However when it comes to digital libraries, the interfaces have typically been designed for older children or adults. Therefore, we have begun to develop a digital library interface developmentally appropriate for young children (ages 5–10 years old). Our prototype system we now call “SearchKids” offers a graphical interface for querying, brow...
Mar 1, 2001 in CHI (Human Factors in Computing Systems)
#1Arman Danesh(SFU: Simon Fraser University)H-Index: 3
#2Kori Inkpen(SFU: Simon Fraser University)H-Index: 55
Last. Kellogg S. Booth(UBC: University of British Columbia)H-Index: 41
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This paper describes a project to explore issues surrouding the development of a collaborative handheld educational application for children. A user-centered, iterative design process was used to develop GeneyTM, a collaborative problem solving application to help children explore genetic concepts using PalmTM handheld computers. The design methodology utilized mock-ups of representative tasks and scenarios, pre-design meetings with targets users, prototype development, and feedback sessions wit...
Small children are not able to use existing communication devices without errors because they are unable to read and because devices typically require faster input than children are able to provide. If an error-proof communication device is designed for small children, it must contain an extremely simple user interface with visual and auditory input and output. In this study, we identify the interaction capabilities that small children have, show everyday problems that 3 and 5 year old children ...
#2Gordon Wyeth(UQ: University of Queensland)H-Index: 27
This paper describes the design, implementation and evaluation of Electronic Blocks, blocks with electronic circuits inside them. By placing Electronic Blocks on top of one another young children build “computer programs” – each stack of Electronic Blocks is capable of a different function. Significantly, the blocks programming input and program output are based in the physical world, with the digital implementation completely hidden from the children. Preliminary studies have found that childre...
We present a new design method that is used within the KidStory project to enable a large number of young children to participate as partners in the design of advanced storytelling technology. The method is an adaptation of the cooperative inquiry method for school environments and uses a combination of evaluation, brainstorming and traditional education methods. These activities have lead to the elaboration of new ideas, impacted the design of existing software and produced a number of interest...
#1Angela Boltman(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 6
Title of dissertation: CHILDREN’S STORYTELLING TECHNOLOGIES: DIFFERENCES IN ELABORATION AND RECALL Angela Boltman, Doctor of Philosophy, 2001 Dissertation directed by: Professor Allison Druin College of Education, Human Development Institute of Advanced Computer Studies This study examined the elaboration and recall of children’s stories through analysis of the content and structure of children’s retelling of a well-known wordless story book, Frog, Where Are You? (Mayer, 1969). This picture book...
#1Houman Alborzi(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 11
#2Allison Druin(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 59
Last. James A. Hendler(UMD: University of Maryland, College Park)H-Index: 92
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Costly props, complicated authoring technologies, and limited access to space are among the many reasons why children can rarely enjoy the experience of authoring room-sized interactive stories. Typically in these kinds of environments, children are restricted to being story participants, rather than story authors. Therefore, we have begun the development of StoryRooms, room-sized immersive storytelling urrent technology implementation and example StoryRooms.
Abstract null null Ample research exists and focuses on teenagers’ understanding of interpersonal privacy on social media. Less is known about younger children’s understanding of privacy and data protection, especially in institutional and commercial data processing contexts. We have spoken to 83 children aged 9-12 years old in two public primary schools in [omitted]. During the 16 workshops we conducted (which consisted of a focus group stage and a co-design exercise), we discussed children’s e...
Last. Teemu Valtonen(University of Eastern Finland)H-Index: 15
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Abstract An entire generation of children is growing up with machine learning (ML) systems that are greatly disrupting job markets as well as changing people’s everyday lives. Yet, that development and its societal effects have been given minor attention in computing education in schools, which mainly focuses on rule-based programming. This article presents a pedagogical framework for supporting middle schoolers to become co-designers and makers of their own machine learning applications. It pre...
Abstract This paper investigates how children who are engaged in a creative project with tangible technology kits make sense of the system feedback the technology provides. A micro-analytic video study was conducted of primary school children designing their own technologies using existing educational microcontrollers. Our investigation reveals that the roles feedback plays in children’s interactions cannot easily be assimilated within the existing approaches to understand feedback that have bee...
Abstract null null Through a set of participatory design (PD) sessions with children with visual impairments and their educators, we understood current practices in maths teaching, and designed a novel system to support learning for this particular educational context. Sixteen children were engaged in 19 PD sessions to develop tangibles and auditory stimuli to represent numbers, and to explore activities to use through a tangible user interface. We describe the context and lessons learned along ...
PURPOSE To develop the storyboard of IACTA further, based on the child''s perspective, by testing and evaluating both re-designed and newly designed scenes. DESIGN AND METHOD A participatory design was used involving preschool children (n = 18) aged three to five who tested and evaluated evolving prototypes of the IACTA application. Think aloud and Active intervention were used to elicit verbal responses from the children. Additionally, observational protocols were used to capture, in a structur...
This paper examines the role of participatory codesign in the creation of parent, teacher, and administrator dashboards for a game-based adaptive instructional system designed to teach math to young children. Taking a learning engineering approach, our team of researchers, curriculum specialists, and UX designers engaged in an iterative design process with six primary school teachers and 4 school administrators with the goal of understanding the appropriateness and effectiveness of the dashboard...
Abstract null null Several workshops use toolkits to engage children in the design of smart things, that is, everyday things like toys enhanced with computing devices and capabilities. In general, the toolkits focus on one design stage or another, e.g., ideation or programming. Few toolkits are created to guide children through an entire design process. This paper presents a toolkit for smart-thing design with children. It revolves around null SNaP , a card-based board game for children. The too...
Purpose: This paper examines how bonded design (BD), a participatory design methodology, was influenced by the transition to working in a virtual environment necessitated by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Design/methodology/approach: Abiding by the participatory design tenets of creativity, learning-by-doing and mutual learning, the BD methodology was created for the specific purpose of fostering meaningful communication and interaction between two disparate groups. Previous i...
User involvement in technology design processes can have positive implications for the designed service, but less is known about how such participation affects people with intellectual disabilities. We explored how 13 individuals with intellectual disabilities experienced participation in the design of a transport support application. The study is based on qualitative interviews, photovoice interviews, participant observations, and Smileyometer ratings. A thematic analysis generated the followin...