Johnny Lee's Wii Hacks: Can the Wii be configured to provide immersive learning experiences?

Thousands of people have been following Johnny Lee's progress as he hacks Nintendo's Wii system. Johnny Lee is a graduate student in the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie-Mellon, and he has come up with the most amazing, creative uses for the various components of the Wi.

Take a look at Johnny's recent video of his work creating desk-top VR using a large-screen display:

"Head Tracking for Desktop Virtual Reality"


Although the Wii is a game system, the possibilities for the Wii as a platform for immersive educational experiences in the classroom - as well as in the family room - are endless, provided that a few people in educational technology are willing to contribute to this effort at the same level demonstrated by Johnny!

Since more classrooms are getting large-screen displays in the form of interactive whiteboards, there might just be a chance for teachers to use a few more tools to invigorate and engage their "digital native" students!

I think that learning activities utilizing the power of the Wii and Johnny's present (and future) hacks might also be very effective in reaching the needs of students who have disabilities. Visual and kinesthetic learners would also benefit, as well as kids and teens who are considered to have hyperactivity.

Johnny provides the code and instruction for all of his hacks on his website at http://johnnylee.net

You can subscribe to project updates at http://procrastineering.com

Johnny Lee's work is creative interactive multimedia technology at its best!

Scratch: A new programming language for kids that supports stories, animations, games, music, art, and web-sharing, from MIT.

"Scratch is designed to help young people (ages 8 and up) develop 21st century learning skills. As they create Scratch projects, young people learn important mathematical and computational ideas, while also gaining a deeper understanding of the process of design." (Scratch website)

Scratch can be downloaded, free of charge, from the website. It can run on Windows as well on Macs. There are over 12,000 contributors to this project, with over 60,000 registered members. The website provides plenty of support for teachers and students.

The Scratch project is run by the Lifelong Kindergarten group at the MIT Media Lab, along with the UCLA School of Education and Information Studies. The project was funded by the National Science Foundation.

I'm looking forward to playing with Scratch on a touch-screen or interactive whiteboard.

Leave a comment if you use Scratch with kids- or for yourself.

The XO $100.00 laptop: One Laptop per Child (OLPC) - article and video of a 9-year-old child's perspective..

If you haven't heard of the OX laptop, take a few minutes and read about it!

Review of a child's experience with an XO laptop.

Clickable guide of the features of the XO laptop.

(The guide contains detailed information about each feature.)

60-Minutes Video

OLPC Website

Let me know what you think!

Keepon, BeatBot's robot: Potential to promote social behavior in children with autism spectrum and developmental disorders.

The BeatBots project develops rhythmically intelligent robots for research and entertainment. In the video below, the responsive robot, Keepon, dances to the Spoon song, "Don't You Evah".

Keepon was developed by Hideki Kozima and programmed by Marek Michalowski, from Carnegie Melon.


(The video is available to the public under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 license.)


According to an article by David Templeton in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

"While the videos have proven Keepon's human appeal, the double-bubble yellow fellow's key role is to interact with children. Keepon has shown promise in encouraging social behavior in children with developmental disorders, including autism."

"Keepon's simple appearance makes children comfortable, and its lifelike movement makes it attractive to them," Mr. Michalowski said. "This combination creates an environment in which social interaction is encouraged.""

"While the robot can dance to almost any song, it also can identify visual and other sensory rhythms, helping to prove how rhythm and synchronization in body language are paramount in human interaction. As such, Keepon has schooled roboticists in how to improve human interaction with robots."

An example of Keepon's attentive and emotive actions:



Another example of Keepon's entertainment value - Spoon's "I turn my camera on":



More videos can be found on the BeatBots website.

My Nokia n800 Internet Tablet!

I recently purchased a Nokia n800 Internet tablet for about $225.00. I'm impressed with all of the features for the price! It works well for making Internet calls via Skype, as it provides an integrated camera/ webcam.

The screen is crisp and easy to read, especially when zoomed in. The screen can be manipulated with a stylus or fingers, and the on-screen keyboard can be enlarged to allow for finger-typing.

Playing around with the device, I can see that it has potential for use in education. In my opinion, the n800 the potential to support low-cost assisted technology and augmented communication applications.

Screen shot of pictures on flickr.

A few specs:

• Direct access to shared media over Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) connectivity and Windows network shares
• Rhapsody Music service client (only available in US)
• Direct access to Nokia Internet Radio Directory with free internet radio stations available
• Supported audio formats: AAC, MP3, WMA, AMR, AWB, M4A, MP2, RA (RealAudio), WAV
• Supported video formats: 3GP, AVI, H.263, H.264, MP4, ASF, WMV, MPEG-1, MPEG-4, RV 7/8/9 (RealVideo)
• Supported playlist formats: M3U, PLS, ASX, WAX, WVX, WPL
• Desktop applet for internet radio
• Storage support for memory cards up to 8GB
• Additional specifications
  

Resources:

Nokia nSeries n800

Detailed Review of n800 running OS2008
(Tips, tricks, hacks, and news about Nokia Internet Tablets and related technology.)

Maemo Downloads for the n800

Internet Tablet Talk

Internet Tablet Wiki

The m-Learning potential of the n800

Linux on Board: Developing for the Nokia n800
Debian/Linux

Cross Post: Microsoft Research SenseCam

From the Microsoft Research SenseCam Website:

"SenseCam is a wearable digital camera that is designed to take photographs passively, without user intervention, while it is being worn. Unlike a regular digital camera or a cameraphone, SenseCam does not have a viewfinder or a display that can be used to frame photos. Instead, it is fitted with a wide-angle (fish-eye) lens that maximizes its field-of-view. This ensures that nearly everything in the wearer’s view is captured by the camera, which is important because a regular wearable camera would likely produce many uninteresting images."

Technology Review Article

The SenseCam application has the potential to be a resource for people who have developmental delays, traumatic brain injury, severe attention deficits, and autism spectrum disorders. It would be a great tool for special educators, occupational and speech/language therapists, and rehabilitation specialists.

Images from Microsoft Research: