from E-Access Bulletin: January 2007 Date: Wednesday, January 24, 2007 5:58 PM Technology news for people with vision impairment ( http://www.headstar.com/eab/ ).
Educational Games. Sticky By Name, Sticky By Nature by Mel Poluck. Audio and other accessible games for the blind have been around for some time and many have a loyal following. But although they could provide the ideal medium to engage children while learning, they are rarely used in the classroom. Very soon that may be set to change however, with the launch of BBC Jam's new accessible learning materials: www.bbc.co.uk/jam a set of online, fun and compelling games for learning National Curriculum topics, some of which were showcased for the first time last week at BETT, the world's largest conference on educational technology. Sonic Science, to name one of these resources, aimed at vision impaired and sighted children of around seven years old, is a game using graphics and speech output for learning about Physics, providing teachers and pupils with a lesson about pressure. Using stereo sound and the directional keys - and peppered with puns perhaps only children could appreciate - the player, in the form of protagonist Harris Hotle must 'push' a cart by holding down the 'up' key for the correct amount of time before releasing to hit another cart at just the right speed so as not to cause a nasty accident. A talking power meter speaks the results to players. "Usually people create resources then try to make it accessible. We're trying to work out something that will work for a lot more children," Jonathan Hassell told delegates at BETT. But this development phase hasn't always been easy, particularly as far as Maths and Science-themed games are concerned. "How do you visualise an abstract concept? That was the challenge," said Hassell. One aspect of the project Hassell and his team have found particularly tough was creating literacy materials for vision impaired pupils he said. "It's different for them - they always have to have someone to give them feedback." Despite this daunting challenge, the team has devised 'Benjamin's House,' named after its narrator, British poet Benjamin Zephaniah, which lets blind children develop Braille reading and writing skills as they explore Zephaniah's virtual house. Using his vivid poems, he introduces us to rooms and objects in his home including the hoover, a spider and even well-known literary characters such as Dr Zeus, who happens to be in the sauna at the time. The whole game, which was tested among schoolchildren in Surrey, England, is replete with sound effects, activities and stories. "We're trying to produce materials children can use on their own," Hassell said, although notes for teachers and parents will be available. And these resources encourage learning outside of the classroom too as users will be able to log in from any computer and everything previously created can be accessed again. The Jam team have received assistance on accessible gaming by the Bartiméus Accessibility Foundation in the Netherlands where developers have created such games as Demor ( http://www.demor.nl/ ) which uses Global Positioning System (GPS) and 3D sound to guide players around a large physical area in which the game takes place. Throughout Jam's development, learners with various disabilities have been considered, including hearing impaired pupils who will soon have access to a literacy game whose animated characters use British Sign Language. "We can do something a lot of companies are afraid to do - take into account children with all kinds of needs," Hassell told delegates. All materials will be available for free, since the entire project was funded by BBC licence-payers, although the downside of this is that materials will not be available for users beyond the UK, although Hassell said this could change in future. "People in other countries who've seen what we've done are desperate for this," he said. "We're re-imagining everything that happens in computer games," said Hassell. "We're re-inventing computer games for people that may have never used them before." NOTE: BBC Jam's accessible games for learning go live in March. Jonathan Hassell jonathan.hassell at bbc.co.uk Thursday March 16 2006 Hi IGDA folks, I'm new to this list, but have been really relieved to find it, as we have much in common... I work in London for BBC jam - a £150 million serious games project, to create eLearning materials for 5-16 year old children in the UK. You can see the sort of things we do by going to www.bbc.co.uk/jam. You'll see closed captions, and the ability to change font size/colour, in our games already. Switch access is proving harder, but we're on our way... My job is to make all of our materials as accessible as possible for children with disabilities. I do this in two ways - to try and make each game as accessible as possible to all children; and to commission new games which are targeted to help specific groups of disabled children, where needed. So, for instance, we are looking at how soundscape techniques (as used in Grizzly Gulch, Shades of Doom, Terraformers etc.) can be used to help us allow blind children to learn and apply science skills. And much, much more. I'm hoping to come to the GDC Tutorial on Monday, and would love to meet as many of you who are going as possible, to get to know you, and kick around some ideas. Think of this as your most recent chance to "help governments (and game commissioners) understand the possibilities of accessible games for learning" (from your 2005 paper), in the UK at least... My current plan is to arrive in San Jose on Saturday night, in good time to get to the workshop on Monday. I'll be returning to the UK on the Tuesday. I want to use my time well while I'm in town, so if anyone's available to meet on the Sunday, or the Monday evening after the workshop, I'd be really delighted to meet you. Otherwise, I'll see you at the workshop. Best ways to get in touch with me: email ( jonathan.hassell at bbc.co.uk ), or mobile (+44 7919 343686 - getting this sorted for the US today). Looking forward to meeting you all. Best regards Jonathan. Jonathan Hassell Accessibility Editor, Digital Curriculum BBC Rm 2365 | White City | 201 Wood Lane | London W12 7TR Landline phone: 020 8752 4271. Mobile: 07919 343686. jonathan.hassell at bbc.co.uk http://www.bbc.co.uk/ _______________________________________________ Gamers mailing list .. Gamers@audyssey.org To unsubscribe send E-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] You can visit http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org to make any subscription changes via the web.
