31 Internet Of T(eac)hings: Assessing Children’s Learning In The IoT Era Fabio Sorrentino Abstract Department of Mathematics and This paper discusses an early prototype aiming at providing Computer Science teachers with means for configuring connected objects that University of Cagliari can be used for assessing the understanding and the cre- Cagliari, CA 09124, Italy ative reworking of children’s learning. In order to do that, we sorrefabio@gmail.com support teachers in defining the information flow between Lucio Davide Spano the connected objects and the interactive manipulation Department of Mathematics and events considered relevant for the assessment. Consid- Computer Science ering that in the last years classrooms have been more and University of Cagliari more equipped with different technological supports, we Cagliari, CA 09124, Italy propose to use them in a more customisable way, helping davide.spano@unica.it both teachers and students in making lessons more enjoy- Riccardo Scateni able and pleasant. Department of Mathematics and Computer Science We focus on already available and low cost technologies, University of Cagliari since more advanced ones may have a high impact on Cagliari, CA 09124, Italy school budgets. Due to this, we propose an approach that riccardo@unica.it uses modular and low cost components that could be em- bedded in different physical objects and easily replicated by schools with a low investment. Author Keywords Internet of things, Children learning, NFC Copyright is held by the author/owner(s). AVI, June 07âĂŞ10, 2016, Bari, Italy ACM Classification Keywords H.5.m [Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI)] 32 Introduction school setting. It is a common belief that people learn while studying and that testing is needed since teachers and educators must somehow measure what actually has been learned. Indeed, in order to improve learning it is usual to spend more time and effort improving teaching rather than testing. On the contrary, Roediger [4] said that testing memory not only assesses what we know but changes it, underlining the important of this task that could be, in some way, under- used by educators. Roediger found that testing as often as studying leads to better long-term retrieval, and that study- ing once and then testing often allows students to retaining the information well in both the short and long term. Testing is one of the most important parts of a successful learning experience [1], it is that particular moment when students demonstrate their understanding of the facts and notions explained by teachers and educators. Testing could be Figure 1: Assessment game developed in the pilot study. A large done in different ways and through many methodologies. screen shows the question with multiple answers. The child can It could be carried out orally or through written material, answer the question inserting a ball inside one of the baskets it could use, for example, true-false statements, multiple below the screen. choice questions or short answers. Our approach is mo- tivated by a simple question: What if learners could play while testing? An EUD learning assessment platform Today, teachers can choose among dozens of available Testing does not always have to be a serious and stress- learning assessment tools and they can easily create their ing experience. It can be immersive, interactive, fun and tests by using free or paid web material. We are currently creative. Playing is fun for children and it represents one studying a solution for creating assessment exercises that of the way they actually learn [5] [3] [2]. Through play, they combine physical exercises and question for rehearsing learn about their environments, their relatives, friends and lesson concepts. the whole world around. Positive play experiences develop positive emotional well-being. So we can use of this positive factors to turn testing into a positive experience. The tar- get user is represented by the school-aged child between 5 and 12 years old. Our approach analysed the possible test- ing scenarios, and the required hardware, in a low budget 33 Figure 2: Master, slave and link modules. is a question which has only one correct answer. We en- vision the developed tool as freely available online where Our main idea is to provide an end-user development (EUD) teachers can create their own questions thus sharing their environment that would enable teachers to use cheap hard- tests. Users, browsing among the available categories in ware for sensing physical objects, for creating learning the system can select which of them are suitable for the les- games that would take advantage from both the physical son, and, if necessary, they can create a set of questions and the digital world. combining more categories by simply removing or adding The teacher, through the support of the EUD environment, single items. defines the game rules and the playing field. From such Each module is designed as a square of a rigid material definition, the environment will suggest how to configure a (i.e. wood or plastic) with a 180mm side having a thickness set of smart modules for supporting the game. The smart of 10mm. At its centre we find a circular hole with a 10mm modules will be different low-cost sensors and hardware diameter. A magnet stripe is placed both on the right and devices, that will be automatically configured for receiving the bottom side, while an iron one is placed on the left and the data. In the rest of the paper, we will describe a small on the top side. These stripes allow teachers to connect pilot study for a multiple answer question game. them in different configurations. The only constraint for the Figure 3: Components used in the set-up is that there will be a single module labelled as mas- very first prototype: an Arduino Smart module design ter while the others will be labelled as slaves. Their smart- nano, an NFC RC522 module and In our first prototype we built a simple platform that man- ness come from a combination of two main elements: an an NFC tag. ages both the creation and the game experience. It allows Arduino nano micro controller and a near field communica- teachers to create a single ten-item quiz, where each item 34 tion (NFC) reader connected to it. This combination gives to each module the computational ability to read an NFC tag and to send its code to a PC through the master module that continuously retrieves all the information read by the slave modules. The NFC technology is a set of communication protocols that enable two electronic devices to exchange informa- tion by bringing them within a short distance. NFC tags are Figure 4: Different examples of physical widget passive component which can be read, and under some circumstances written to, by an NFC device. The composed modules create a single block that can be These widgets could have different shapes and materials (it connected to the main PC through an USB cable. From is sufficient that they fit inside the hole placed in the square now on, all the data read by the modules will be sent to the module) and in our early test we used foam balls placing system making possible the user interaction. The game an NFC tag inside of them. At this point we can associate requires a initial configuration, in fact the user may insert widgets students/players and the modules represents the the number of players and their NFC ID. The association available answers for the current question. The system can between user and ID is a guided operation; firstly, the sys- actually identify the answers given by the players checking tem requires the name of the player, secondly the player their correctness. may bring its physical widgets within four centimetres of the master module. This way the name of the player will Conclusion and future work In this paper we discussed our idea for creating an EUD be associated to the widget and the given answers will be environment supporting teachers in developing learning as- recorded for the right player. sessment games. We developed a first game prototype for Even if the default physical widgets are simple foam balls understanding the requirements and technical difficulties in equipped with an NFC tag, teachers can create different automating the configuration of the physical object sensing ones working together with their students 4. hardware. Testing scenario In the future we would like to implement the environment, We describe the usage of these modules for a quiz game, focusing on two main parts: the first one is the configura- combining them with a screen or a projected surface. Mod- tion engine, that will receive the teacher-defined configu- ules can be combined by using the magnet stripes, secur- ration and would generate the instructions for connecting ing them with an optional frame that can hosts up to four the hardware and generate the code for reading data and module as shown in figure 1. This smart component allows playing the game. students to give their answers to the test by using physical The second part is the EUD support, applying the existing widgets equipped with NFC tags. 35 state of the art metaphors for defining the data flow, and observation, interaction and reflection. British studying how to represent the start modules in a simple yet Educational Research Journal 32, 2 (2006), 191–207. precise way the different modules. 4. Henry L. Roediger and Jeffrey D. Karpicke. 2006. Test-Enhanced Learning: Taking Memory Tests REFERENCES Improves Long-Term Retention. Psychological Science 1. 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