Content for the TikTegel

Abstract

The TikTegel, by Serious Toys, is a game computer that looks like a tablet, without keyboard, mouse or traditional screen. Players interact with the board by placing objects on it and receive auditive and visual feedback by sound and parts of the board that light up. The objective of the project is to use the tangible interactive possibilities of the TikTegel to create a new learning aid for the first two classes of primary school in the Netherlands. Education in group 1-2 is a versatile process that includes both learning specific things and general development. In the classroom teachers create an environment where children 'learn' in different ways: pupils are completely free to decide what they do, teachers take up child initiatives or activities are prescribed by the schedule or as a result of personal development of a pupil. A set of predefined targets imposed by the government, the Kerndoelen, are used in different ways to set up educational activities. Rules of a game create a structure that can lead the activity of playing in a specific (educational) direction. When knowledge and challenges are included in a, for players, meaningful way a game can create educationally valuable and internally motivating activities. A game on the TikTegel consists of multiple different interactive reactions to physical objects. It can create an adaptable structure that provides multiple interrelated educationally valuable experiences. The TikTegel can create a ‘small world’ (physical and reactive) based on the rules and logic that we want a pupil to learn at that moment. This objective includes three opportunities that combine the qualities of the TikTegel with education in group 1-2: learn about physical aspects, a structure of different behaviours that induce combined learning effects and adjustment to an individual pupil. The final design is a set of five separate games in which the weight of objects has to be used in different ways to be successful. Objects, games and difficulty levels are put together in such a way that progress requires an increased notion about the concept of weight and advancing skills for applying this knowledge throughout the games. The level of difficulty adapts to the playing pupil. New challenges are provided in small steps, giving pupils the possibility to find out something themselves. When this finding out is too slow or absent the system will provide more guidance. A working prototype with the five games was used for one week in a classroom. Observing pupils and feedback from teachers showed that the material creates an internally motivating and educationally valuable activity. Pupils learn about weight and the exploratory approach is recognised to train cognitive thinking skills. As mentioned above there are different needs towards the learning process. In the prototype teachers appreciated the exploratory character (to develop thinking skills) more than the guidance (to guarantee learning specific aspects of weight). Additional optimisation should reveal if there is a balance in which this material can foresee in both needs.