Mobile Storytelling: A New Mobile Library For Kids

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Mobile StorytellingA New Mobile Library For Kids

• Jerry Alan Fails
• Allison Druin

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Collaboratively Construct Childrens Stories
in Mobile Settings
Mobile
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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Collaboratively Construct Childrens Stories
in Mobile Settings
Mobile
Children
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Mobile
Mobile
Technologies
Technologies
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Other Devices
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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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Mobile Kids
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Other Devices
Cameras
MP3 Players
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Why Mobile? (1 of 2)

• Availability via growth of the mobile market
• New high in 2004 sales surpass prior
  expectations
• Rise 15 in 2005, to almost 780 million units
• Annual sales 1 billion in 2009
• Totaling 2.6 billion active devices in 2009
• Annual sales 1.4 billion in 2010
• (Wood et al., 2005 Hirst et al., 2006)
• In developing countries cell phones used, but not
  computers
• Bridges physical and traditional desktop
• Ability to create in context

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Why Mobile? (2 of 2)
Children are mobile!!!
Inside the house
Where have you been?
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Kids Mobile Device Summary

• Devices for Consumption/Entertainment
• Video, Music, Games
• Range of Interactions
• None, Play-acting along with, Communicating,
  Collecting data, filling-in forms or Educational
  drill and kill, Gaming, Collaborating (very
  few)
• Need to make
• Mobility part of purpose, not just a feature
• Mobile devices more creative, generative,
  constructive!!!

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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Constructionism

• Educational learning paradigm (Papert Harel,
  1991)
• Learn-by-making
• Learn because you build/create a public artifact
• Paperts examples
• Art Sculptures (Soap Sculptures)
• Building blocks
• Sand Castles
• More examples
• Reports
• Collages
• Dioramas
• Dissertations
• Presentations

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Logo (Papert, 1980) Constructionism Children
Children
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Creative Tools
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Collaboration
To work together, especially in a joint
intellectual effort.
Spatial Spatial
Co-located Distributed
Temporal Synchronous Same Place Time Different Place, Same Time
Temporal Asynchronous Same Place, Different Time Different Place Time
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Why?

• Constructionism
• Collaboration
• Educational benefits
• Developmentally appropriate
• Social development

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Tangible Flags (Chipman, 2006) Syllable (Zurita,
2004) Constructionism / Children / Collaboration
/ Mobile
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Logo (Papert, 1980) Constructionism Children
Pixter (Fisher Price) Sketchy
(goknow) Constructionism / Children / Mobile
KidPad (Hourcade, 2003) Constructionism /
Children / Collaboration
Savannah (Benford, 2004) Geney (Danesh,
2004) Collaboration / Children / Mobile
Ambient Woods (Rogers, 2004) Collaboration /
Children
Children
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Tangible Flags

• Started breaking down the collaborative barriers
• Allowed mobility and knowledge construction
• Demonstrated the importance of construction/creati
  on in context and collaboration
• (Chipman et al., 2006)

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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ICDL

• International Childrens Digital Library
• www.childrenslibrary.org

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Narrative Systems StoryBuilder (Antle,
2003) Moose Crossing (Bruckman, 1997) KidPad
(Hourcade, 2003) PETS (Druin, 1999) Renga (Cassel
2004) StoryRooms (Montemayor, 2004) Literacy
Fieldtrip (Halloran, 2006) Constructive /
Childrens / Stories
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Authoring Tools Notepad Sketchy (goknow)
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Collaboratively Constructing Childrens Stories in
Mobile Settings
Constructing Childrens Stories in Mobile Settings
?
Collaborative Childrens Stories in Mobile
Settings
Ebooks
Childrens Stories in Mobile Settings
Children
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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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What Does this Afford?

• Mobility
• Purpose, not a feature
• Promotes collaboration
• Construction in context
• Collections kids collect but dont organize
• Practice for real-life
• necessity of building representations (reports,
  essays, dissertations, etc.)
• Empowers children to build upon previous work
• Continuum from consumption to generation

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Prototype System

• Stories and Scenes
• Pictures
• Text
• Sound
• Client/server model
• Changes propagated to
• each device
• Over 802.11

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Devices Used
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How Collected Data

• Participatory design sessions
• Kidsteam
• Video
• Digital artifacts
• Notes

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Collaboratively Constructing Childrens Stories in
Mobile Settings
Constructing Childrens Stories in Mobile Settings
Collaborative Childrens Stories in Mobile
Settings
Childrens Stories in Mobile Settings
Children
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Reading
Mobile
Childrens
Stories
Constructionism
Collaboration
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Creation Writing Words
Mobile
Childrens
Stories
Constructionism
Collaboration
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Fieldtrip to Fort McHenry
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Evolution of a Scene
1221 Changed picture 1225 Changed text 1227
Changed picture 1231 Changed text 1232 Changed
picture 1233 Changed picture 1234 Changed
picture 1235 Changed picture 1237 Changed
picture
Mobile
Childrens
Stories
Constructionism
Collaboration
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Audio Data Collection
Mobile
Childrens
Stories
Constructionism
Collaboration
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Construction
Mobile
Childrens
Stories
Constructionism
Collaboration
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Face-to-Face Collaboration
Mobile
Childrens
Stories
Constructionism
Collaboration
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Trends from the Data

• Kids collaborated and elaborate
• Liked to read and play the stories
• Liked text entry and voice entry
• Older kids liked text entry, younger liked the
  voice
• Need a device per child!!!
• Supported different levels of construction
• Older more in depth
• Younger pictures and few words
• Younger kids
• Initially more excited
• Had a hard time with it
• Want on-screen controls
• Despite small screens
• Having physical buttons

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Prototype Limitations (1 of 2)

• Navigation problems
• Buttons an issue
• On-screen controls

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Prototype Limitations (2 of 2)

• No integrated camera
• Range of wireless (for collaboration)
• Interface
• Screen space
• Simple scene/page paradigm

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For the Future

• Community
• Collaboration
• Awareness
• What others are doing (viewing, editing, etc.)
• Where people are in the library/story/page
• Allow story branching
• Interface changes
• On-screen controls
• Allow drawings and image capture
• via integrated camera
• Different visualizations
• Fish-eye
• Different overview, zoom and filter, details on
  demand

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A New Mobile Library for Kids
Stories
Collaboration
Constructionism
Mobile
Children
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Questions

• Acknowledgments
• Kidsteam
• Kevin McGehee
• Gene Chipman
• Mona Leigh Guha
• Shaili Desai
• Ben Bederson
• National Park Service

fails_at_cs.umd.edu allisond_at_umiacs.cs.umd.edu
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Plagiarism?

• Easy to take, but easier to give credit
• Goal is to foster creativity
• About education, not publication
• Should meet the same standards of education
• Example of 5 year old copying Clifford Book