George Paravantes | Interaction Design MA Grad Student
What are the next directions?
I will summarize my thesis research based on my periodical readings and journal research, online research, and school classroom visits along with some academia both educational and technological interviews.
There are four general areas i would like to pursue going forward.
01 Tangible interactive teaching tools in understanding math concepts. Tangible Interaction will [...]
Increasingly , finding ways to leverage technology in a way that expands global communication are more likely to advance, while those who no not will find themselves on the sidelines. The ELMO is a digital visual presenter that lets educators engage students with analog methods in a digital format [...]
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Next Generation of Educational Interactive Tools
What will the future of interactive educational tools look like?. The general trends towards ubiquitous computing, open source software solutions, and the commoditization of computing should make processing power available and more of an economic option within financially sensitive school environments. The tablet PC form factor is maturing [...]
Applications and possibilities
Autodesk Tangible View Cube:The cube is a small wireless device with built-in accelerometers and magnetometers to allow absolute coordinates of the cube to be passed to an application. to correlate and control 3D navigation.
Multi-touch development has been around since the early eighties.With its ability to use finger gestures as a way to interact [...]
Todays classroom have many resources a teacher can use to help facilitate the education of his/her students. Both analog and and increasingly digital methods are finding their way into class rooms. So as we move forward what opportunities exist to help educators take abstract subjects like math and computer languages and help student visualize [...]
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The use of Legos in their simplest form provide great skills in Construction- build a car, house, town, or robot. Sorting the pieces helps learn about colours and shapes. Math manipulatives-who needs coins to count?
Patterning-Lego also helps establish preschooler’s to achieve reading readiness.
Constructionist learning is inspired by the constructivist theory that individual learners construct mental models to understand the world around them. However, constructionism holds that learning can happen most effectively when people are also active in making tangible objects in the real world. In this sense, constructionism is connected with experiential learning and builds on some [...]
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Piaget’s Cognitive Stages
Child psychologist Jean Piaget described the mechanism by which the mind processes new information. He said that a person understands whatever information fits into his established view of the world. When information does not fit, the person must reexamine and adjust his thinking to accommodate the new information. Piaget described four stages of [...]
Current Teaching Practices
“Its important that if I want to teach
Plant growth…..that I plant a plant.”
“How can you teach a child about
animal life science by using a screen?”
“For a child to learn something it helps
to have the hands on, and they need
the actual object.”
“Sometimes when you present them
with too much information they get
distracted and don’t know [...]
