Inclusive learning technologies and the sensory turn: a case study with wearables

As part of the Accessimap research project, and in continuation of our work on Mapsense, we decided with a small group of children and teachers to focus on technologies for Geography field-trips. We had previously identified that technologies designed for visually impaired children focused on translating visual representations using another modality. Instead, we propose to investigate the specificity of visually impaired children's experiences and how it could be leveraged for learning.

Our aims were: for teachers to better understand children's experiences of field-trips; for children to enable them to better reflect on the these field-trips, and having the possibility to produce their own content; for us researchers, to investigate whether this could change value judgements about the use of abstract audio content in the classroom. In turn, we hoped it could change the often negative perceptions of their sighted peers. We designed two versions of a probe, enabling to record and play audio cues.

The first version of the probe, a kit to assemble one's own wearable device with tactile elements on velcro.

Results

This project is the core of a full paper accepted at CHI 2018, written with my supervisor Gilles Bailly.