About my exploratory research

lyit09 — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 14:36:35 +0000

Information will be added this week, I will be talking about why I have chosen the various groups to participate and what I hope to achieve from these focus groups.Excerpts from my theme sheets will be published here, if you have any comments on these I would be grateful if you dropped me a line.
Next week, I will be conducting my focus groups with the educational therapist and teachers of autistic children. I will also have some results from my EYE gaze exeriment…I will keep you posted.
Thanks

Launching into design!

lyit09 — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 13:48:03 +0000

Reward screens (1&2)

Hi There, this is my first of many posts to update you on my progress. Just a little background about me and my research: click to read on…

I have been funded by the Minister for Children and the National Children’s strategy in Ireland to design an interactive computer program that will teach autistic children (age 3 -6) daily living skills. I have spent the last year learning about autism and barriers in communication, I have attended many autism and special needs conferences and have presented a poster on my research at the International Autism Conference in London last year. The feedback on my research to date has been very positive and encouraging. I am working with parents of autistic children, therapists who work with autistic children and teachers who teach this group. I have been very lucky to secure advice from various other professional in the field of research. Their advice has been valuable to this project.

This month I hope to have completed my EYE Gaze and focus experiment, I will test the interactive experiment on two autistic groups ( 1 aged 3 the other 6 years old) and one control group (typically developed child aged 5). I have included a few screen shots of the interface to date (at infancy stage). I will give you an update next week. On tuesday I will conduct my first of three focus groups with the Donegal Autism support group, they have been brilliant and very encouraging. I will keep you updated.

This first screen shot is the primary interface – the variable to test is hand and eye coordination, the child is guided through narration and will be asked to click on the animated bird. Two screens will be presented – the first will have the bird on the left and the second the bird will be placed on the right. This will also test the ability to take instruction via interactive narrative and animation.

The rotating wheel will test the theory that autistic children are pleased when they see items that move in a rotating fashion. This button will be used to also test if they are motivated to move to next stage by clicking this wheel.

Testing Reward

Failure to click the animation will not be highlighted, this will only discourage the child. Rewards for correct response will be in the form of a pleasing animation which will be repeated until the child click the rotating wheel on the bottom right corner ( see above slide) this will test, motivation by reward.