Pirates, Firemen and Ninjas: Enhancing a location aware travel training tool

Maria SaridakiNew Technologies Laboratory in

Communication, Education and the Mass Media

University of Athens

Nick Shopland Interactive Systems Research

Group, School of Science & Technology

Nottingham Trent University

Routemate

• Accessible location based travel training app

• to help people with intellectual disabilities and other physical disabilities to learn simple routes

• Android application and desktop console

RECALL

Reconnecting Excluded Communities and Lifelong Learning• Partnership from UK, Bulgaria,

Romania & Greece• Development split into 3 phases

– Plan– Use– Challenge

• Partners conducted testing for each phase, followed by piloting

Planning

Usage

Routemate - Challenge mode

• Goal is to improve learners’ cognitive map formation• Challenge mode seeks to bring more gaming

approaches to the interaction between the user and the device, by adding a number of gaming elements to the standard use mode– As landmarks approach, RouteMate challenges the user

to select the next key landmark from three of the pictures with which they themselves have added to personalized their route

Gamification of travel training

• Extend challenges to the whole travel training process– Develop scenarios that enhance travel training sessions– Provide additional icons (e.g. treasure, jewels, useful

items) which can be added as waypoint indicators– Alternative interactions available as waypoints are

encounteredThe goal is to make the travel training process playful

Routemate - Challenge mode scenarios

Extending the landmark style and interactions in different ways, and using them to scaffold different phases of use of the app. These activities are proposed to be:

• Pirates – a sequential treasure hunt - associated with route planning and creation activities

• Ninjas – a “scavenger hunt” to find as many items as possible - associated with using route

• Firemen - find fires and put them out - associated with developing independence / confidence (on a particular route

Challenge Mode – Games Based Learning

To teach/reinforce the concept of maps and route learning, a games approach has been adopted that:• Allows students to insert

different icons to waypoints in planning mode (e.g., treasure)

• The student is then challenged to find this treasure in the real world, using game play around treasure hunts, or pirates, for example.

• Promotes the connection between the map and the real world

The Emerald Sword and the Route Ninjas

• You are Super Ninjas ready to find the lost jewels of the emerald sword! Where is the next jewel hidden? Follow the map carefully!

• Be careful, Evil Samurai Engines might block your way and guide you away from the jewels. Mind your steps young Ninja and always follow the pedestrian footsteps of the great elder ninjas before you!May all Green Traffic Lights guide your way!

Route of the Pedestrian Pirates

Follow the blue marks on the mystical map and be first to the location of the super secret treasure.Be careful though, while roving the seas, remember to watch for the green lights and guard against the hungry sharks that await you and your crew!

Gaming elements per piloting site

• Greek piloting site used locative gamified scavenger hunt scenarios, using premade narratives with pirates and ninjas.

• Users tried to find the next spot in order to achieve their final goal and win the game, alone or collaborate in teams

• The entire process was assisted with stickers and tags in order to achieve goals and provide feedback to the users

Bulgaria

• Bulgarian piloting sites, user’s age varied from 26 to 68 and they face visual and hearing impairments, mobility impairments and/or mild intellectual disability.

• They used a scavenger hunt gamified approach.• Quoting the researchers “the facilitator said to the

user that today’s session will be as a game - to find the "treasure" at the end point. If the user completed the tasks successfully at the end of the session he/she will receive a gift”.

UK

• UK piloting site did use a gamified approach during the sessions, using very basic games around map reading skills to locate places on route. They mainly used very simple quiz e.g. 'what do you do at this building? - matching words with pictures'.

• According to the researchers gaming factors assisted with the engagement, route comprehension as well as the memory of the users.

Romania• Romanian training site, the age range of their

users was between 11 to 39 years. They had no prior experience with smartphones and technology and had learning and intellectual disabilities.

• The researchers stated that the did not have to use any further game scenarios or scavenger hunt game since their users perceived the Routemate application per se as a game.

• They also expressed their interest in using educational locative games for your users in the near future.

• combining RouteMate, with game based learning elements was successful

• the majority of the piloting sites integrated it in their piloting sessions,

• while users were more than keen to immerse themselves in the gaming scenario.

• All piloting sites were willing to use educational locative games for their users in the near future

• useful framework for motivational and independent route learning for users with a range of different disabilities.

Thank you for listening

Maria Saridaki msaridaki@gmail.com Nick Shopland nicholas.shopland@ntu.ac.uk http://recall-project.eu/

http://routemate.isrg.org.ukThis site will:

• Register an interest in being kept informed of Route Mate releases

• Give access to the Android app

and inform users of updates.

• Support the app beyond the lifetime of the RECALL project.

• Provide a place where strategies and experiences can be shared.

• Enable reporting of bugs and other issues that you may encounter.