Abstract:

In 2005 a set of educational renewals were introduced in The Netherlands under the common name “het nieuwe leren” – literal translation: the new learning. These renewals resulted in problem driven education were students have to solve problems in project groups with little assistance of a teacher, using peer consulting and collaboration.

A group that has problems with these educational renewals are children with an autism spectrum disorder. These children have difficulty with skills such as working in groups, collaboration and taking initiative, which are the prerequisites to “het nieuwe leren”. As a result, a lot of children who formerly could go to a regular school now have to go to a school for special education because they no longer fit in.

It is very important for these children to learn how to work in groups for their further education as well as their future working life.

To teach children with PDD-NOS how to collaborate, a serious game with multi-touch interaction has been developed. The use of multi-touch technology allows for two (or more) children to work with the same computer and screen at the same time. It also provides a fun and intuitive way of interacting.

The game that was built consists of six levels with different math problems designed to learn specific basic parts of working together. Two players start out at level 1 with each their own part of the screen and their own equations. Playing through the game they have to start cooperating more and more. The theme of the game is about building a rocket and the math problems are in that context. The players have to collect parts, collect inventory, mix fuel and protect their rocket until it can be launched successfully.

For four weeks the game has been tested at an elementary school for special education. Preliminary results are promising. The teachers recognize improvements while the children were playing the game. A longer period of use is probable necessary to accomplish a transfer to the classroom and more in general: to real life. During the test period little or no structural behaviour changes were observed in the classroom yet.

Keywords:

multi-touch, serious game, tabletop, education, collaboration, autism, pdd-nos.