Sunday, October 25, 2009

Note from "Tipping Point"

Tipping point Chapter 3: The Stickiness Factor: Sesame Street, Blue's Clues, and the Educational Virus

- Importance of Interactivity, Daniel Anderson who worked with Nickeolodeon designing Blue's Clue's says, Blue's Clues was created with philosophy to give opportunity to have children behaviorally active. "Steve spends almost all hist time on screen talking directly at the camera' (123)

-Human's eye is capable of focusing on only small area at one tine - a perpetual span - Usually centered (108)

- Nickelondeon's Blues clues is stickier than Sesame street because it purely targeted young children whereas Sesame Street had adults' element to have parents watch together (112)

- Blue jump through magical doorways, play puzzle game with Steve -> more fun (122)

- Strangely, Sesame street didn't stick with the idea where they want to hear kids' response (123)

- Anderson," the driving force for a preschooler is not a search for novelty , like it is with older kids, it's a search for understanding and predictability. For younger kids repetition is really valuable. They demand it. When they see a show over and over again, they not only are understanding it better, which is a form of power but just by predicting what is going to happen. I think they feel a real sense of affirmation and self-worth. And Blue's CLues doubles that feeling because they also feel like they are participating in some thing. They feel like they are helping Steve!(The children responded to the show in a different way with each repeat viewing becoming more animated and answering more of Steve's question. (126)

- Blue's Clues succeeds as a story of discovery only if the clues are in proper order. The show has to start out EAST - to give the viewers confidence- and then get progressively harder and harder, challenging the preschoolers more and more, drawing them into the narrative. (129)

- Adding Big Bird made difference (132)

Educational Apple App for Toddlers


http://www.24x7digital.com/content/view/178/90/

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Controllers


Should I use controllers?
I would love to!

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Feedback & thoughts

After the short presentation on my paper fishing game today, more refined ideas came along.

-I might include counting numbers objects in the bucket at the end of the game. I will need the suggestion from psychologist and educators to figure out it's not too much for them.

- I will contact game design professor and get opinion.

- I could buy number pads and customize it

- I need more level design: farm, pond, sea...

- I'm sure that I will simply introduce sound, number, vocabulary words via fun

Monday, October 19, 2009

New Prototype







My new prototype is a fishing game constructed on the paper. There are four words (i.e. airplane, cup, rabbit, and fish) in three languages of English, Spanish and Korean written on the shaped paper. Each paper is attached to a magnet so the children will be able to pick the letters with a fishing rod, also attached to a magnet.
My thesis concept stays the same: familiarizing preschoolers with three languages. I clearly decided not to teach them. The academic goal of this game is to introduce vocabulary words, not sentences. My target audience is still four to six years old and depend on their age, I will add one more or less vocabulary words. Thus, I’m adding some level design to the game.
Throughout the observation I made at the preschool two weeks ago, I concluded that the reason I couldn’t successfully test out the game digitally created was because it was not fully functioning so that kids were confused to play the game. Also, four years old kids had a difficult time understanding and possibly controlling the mouse. So, they lost interest in playing it. I really want them to enjoy this new game.
This time I’m making a paper version before actually creating it with Flash Actionscript because I want to plan the game first in reality to catch the downside of the game and create into a digital format. What I found is that it’s difficult to fix a game with the coding environment because you will need to change lots of lines and it gets very confusing.

Kid's Festival







Kid's Festival was held at Madison Square Park last Saturday. Despite it was rainy day, many family came out and picked up pumpkins and apples together. There were many events like face painting, Halloween food making... and all foods were free. I watched kids running around and got excited about Holloween. They were wearing costumes already. I want to make a game that can excite kids.

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Upside Down

What I have found out so far, simplicity is the best theme for kid's entertainment.
This show not only is simple but imaginative.

Playing games





There are so many fun games existing already. But now all of them are necessarily educational. So, I'm just playing with many games and get some inspiration to incorporate an educational aspect to my project.

Thursday, October 15, 2009

What's in my brain now

- Search teaching method for different markets

- Work on paper prototype

- Do more character drawing

- Play more games!

- Talk to people in bilingual institutions (e.g., French Institution, PS...)

- Visit places that will inspire me (e.g., museums, parks, kid's event...travel :) )


- Should I try 3D?

Goals

I have made academic goals lil' more specific.

1. To motivate children to enjoy and learn about new culture
-There are many other kids like me but they speak different language. "I want to play with them!"
-Knowing language is a way to socialize
-Recognizing advantages of learning foreign language in the society
2.To boost interest in foreign language
-Realizing learning new language is fun
-Learning new language is not difficult
-Understanding other language makes smart person - you get rewards
3. To introduce basic vocabularies of English, Korean, and Spanish
-Knowing daily and interesting words in three languages
- Recognizing difference between the three
- Learning native pronunciation

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

A brief Interview

Jiho Yoon, the director of Worick Preschool, Seoul, South Korea


What would be the effective way to teach children?
Fun, nothing boring, hand eye coordination

Think about their attention Span -> 3-5 min

Consider individuality -> create something that's agreeable to all

Omar's project - Banjar

It's always great to hear about one's project in person because I was able to have myself more engaged. I told Omar that I'm neither U.S. Citizen nor interested in politics but he said his website will be also designed for someone like me who doesn't know much about political issues. His goal is to maintain intellectual discussion among different political parties and fully understand systems. I can definitely tell Omar is passionate about the Banjar project and he is collaborating with Greg so I expect truly high-quality website that isn't like any other websites out there.

I had a chance to look at the basic format of the website and it doesn't look like a political website at all where usually blue and red colors are all over. It seemed easy to navigate. I would like to see how it is going to become a social realm for being a casual political website with a very simple form. We talked about how facebook has many options and tend to draw attention from many confusing advertisement. Banjar site is not going to be non-commercial and informative. Having many visual materials have both good and bad aspects. I think Omar's project needs to stay simple and straightforward as possible.

Now, what is missing for the project is actual user testing among groups. Surveys among individuals are well done and it's still in progress. How to make people understand politics better and clear? A group interaction scenario via a group chatting will help to figure out how people interact over the political issues and this must be done before building the website.

What else could he try? Many times a logo of website tends to become an overview so Omar and Greg could work on that and have professors, peers and users look at them and give feedbacks. In the website, registered people may want to have ratings so that will give a mode of satisfaction from writing a thoughtful essays and comments and encourage more participation.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Games for toddlers


Cookie Monster Game

I have been playing many games over the weekend and try to figure out the level design or difficulty that kids in young ages might have. Their sound is very fun and the repetitive gestures and rhythms are the keys in many games.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Motivation for my project

Belief in young children’s language acquisition ability

Transition from the previous work

Love for being and working with children

Saturday, October 10, 2009

A way to teach music notes

Surely, teaching through embodiment play is important for learning in daily lives.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

How to create a special flash game


Out of so many flash games that are already there, how will I be able to make something unique, fun, educational? During this weekend, I'm just going to play tons of games... and note what's good and bad about them.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Observation

Pictures are taken at Hanai Preschool, Flushing, NY
What I found out:

-Most of 5-6 years old children speak both Korean and English but not 4 years old ones

-5-6 years children enjoyed the game more than 4 years ones

-Green robot is the most popular character

-Kids love to touch the screen and push the keyboard

-Kids are excited about jumping and spinning

-Kids seem to enjoy the animation more

I'm going for a game!

After presenting my first prototypes and having conversation with Louisa today, I decided to go with a game. What I'm going to do from now on till next week is to play lots of games and see what is appealing to the audience. Also, I'm moving toward entertainment than education. I mean I'm still keeping both concept but the ratio would be...

entertainment:education =6:4

Monday, October 5, 2009

Dooli Remix

Dooli the little dinosaur is one of the most popular classic animation in Korea. Some DJ remixed this song. This makes me happy and less stressed out :)

@ Children's Museum



I visited Children's Museum in upper west side last Sunday and got a chance to play this interactive sailing game. It's pretty good to have children play with balance. You have to move left and right to get the boat going in the right direction. This is similar to a SMALLab environemnt in a way but a difference is that this screen was vertical. There's no end in this game because your boat doesn't get damaged though you hit the rocks.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Goal

To introduce basic words in English, Spanish and Korean most effectively

To heighten interest in foreign languages.

To make a visually amusing project

To interact with audience for enhanced learning