ET Maze 2005

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ET Maze 2005

• Megan, Michael, David, Michael

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What Are We Doing?

• Creating a Maze Program to help persons who are
  blind with spatial awareness
• Using haptic devices to enable users to get
  feedback from the program that they can then
  use in actual situations

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What devices we are using

• The Sensable Phantom Omni
• The Microsoft Sidewinder Force Feedback 2
  Joystick

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What problem will it solve?

• Our goal is to help children who are blind with
  their spatial awareness
• There is not a lot of assistance out there of
  this sort we plan on providing a fun way to
  learn
• We hope to increase their spatial skills so that
  they feel much more comfortable in their
  surroundings
• Eventually we want to include school mapping and
  audio elements to our project

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Who are we helping?

• We are targeting young children who are blind
• However, our project may overlap into an older
  sector as well
• By the end of the semester we plan on having a
  day of fun, Maze Day, for children to come in and
  test out our finished project
• We are also going to give away a joystick to a
  school that we feel could use it we received an
  APPLES grant that will let us do this

6
The Real Maze

• Part of our project will include an actual maze
  that students will be able to walk through
• It will be constructed upstairs in the department
  and will be made mostly of foam blocks
• This will allow users to gain an understanding of
  the environment that they learned from the
  computer game

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Tactile Mazes

• We will also have several tactile mazes for
  students to use
• These are going to allow the kids to gain an even
  better understanding of the area the maze covers
• It will decrease frustration from students and
  help them out a bit more
• Pass around Tactile Maps

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Sound

• The addition of sound to our mazes will allow the
  students to create a better picture in their
  heads of what the maze looks like
• Having sounds when they pass certain obstacles
  and at the beginning and end of the maze will let
  students have a better idea of where they
  actually are
• These sounds will also let the students know if
  they are going back to an area they have already
  passed

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MAZE DAY ! ! ! ! !

• We will be holding a Maze Day on April 27 from
  900 200
• This will be for students to come test out our
  project and many others
• It will be a learning experience for everyone
• Please come and check it out

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??Any questions??Demo (if time)

• Thanks!