Blitzmerker: Learning Idioms with a Mobile Game

© author(s) of these slides including research results from the KOM research network and TU Darmstadt; otherwise it is specified at the respective slide
3-Jun-15
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ralf Steinmetz
KOM - Multimedia Communications Lab
Gamedays 2015
Blitzmerker: Learning Idioms
with a Mobile Game
Laila Shoukry
Laila Shoukry, M.Sc.
Polona Caserman

KOM – Multimedia Communications Lab 2
Serious Games Group

Autism and Social Interaction – The Problem
lutherwood.ca/
Autism Spectrum Disorder
 Most common cognitive disability
 Prevalence rate of 1 in 88 children
 Mainly affects social skills, communication
skills and interests
Deficits in Social Interaction
 Lack knowledge of how to properly
interact
 Lose motivation in social interaction
Develop social anxiety One factor: inability
to understand abstract concepts during
conversations difficulty responding to
metaphors and symbols
msnkarthik.com

Understanding Proverbs
In German: Die Kuh vom Eis holen.
What it means: Escape a risky situation.

Autism and Social Interaction – Intervention
behaviorfrontiers.com
Training Social Skills
 Improvement in response to exposure and
training
 But: decreased motivation increases social
gap Early Intervention to avoid escalation
 ABA: Applied Behavioral Therapy -
individualized coaching via therapists
Why Simulations and Games?
 Training social skills in non-real world
situations
 Encouraging environments with reduced
risk of failure and quick reward [1,2]
 Inherently interesting for Autistic children
[3]
 Less expensive for everyday use [4] tdlc.ucsd.edu

Software for Autism
Teachtown.com
Success
 Popular applications more accessible to a
wider audience [4]
 Practicing social and cognitive skills shown
to be effective [5]
 use of multimedia to simulate real-life
situations shows positive effects [4]
Design Requirements
 Using motivating visual and auditory
stimuli [5,6]
 Adaptive, individualized training [7,8]
 Different Configuration Options [8,9]
 Progress Statistics and Parent/Teacher
Dashboards
Teachtown.c
om
socialcluesgame.com

Blitzmerker
Idea
 Learning the meanings of different proverbs
 Engaging in conversations with different
characters
 Quizzes and additional info to improve
understanding
Features
 Available for German and English Idioms
 Extendable to other languages:
Conversations in xml format
 Difficulty Adaptations
 Different stories for longer engagement
 Encouraging Feedback and Hints
 Sound Effects and Interactive Elements

Blitzmerker – Story Structure

Personalization
Configuration Options
 Profiles for different users
 Choosing Language
 Background Image and Music
 Color of Text and Buttons
 Choose Character
 Use Photo as Avatar
 Reading Conversations Aloud
Parental Control Options
 Set maximum playing time per day
 Adapt Feedback and Toggle Sound
 Adding timers and bonus points

Logging
Logged Data
 Path in the story from start to end
 Tapped points on the screen
 Time required for each section
 Total time played
 Attempts to select the right answer
 Time needed for each answer
 Interruptions of gameplay
Benefits
 provide insights for both game design and
player progress evaluation
 Insight into game settings, tapped points,
story paths and learning progress

Evaluation
Field Study
 12 Children aged 8 to 16
 With parents and teachers
 Played on Android tablet devices
 Questionnaires before and after playing
 Observations by researcher and logging
statistics
Expert Evaluation
 Teachers and therapists who were also
involved in data collection and game
design
 Interviews, attending and observing field
studies and filling out questionnaires

Evaluation – Results
Observations
 no difficulty to interact, experience with
mobile devices
 motivated each other, compared
achievements and discussed the stories
they played
 Showed strong interest and wanted to
continue playing at home
 Some design improvements suggested
Questionnaires and Logging
 Differences in Abilities and Preferences
 high rating for the idea, audio,
comprehensibility and ease of use
 Goog rating for content, graphics, control
and fun
 75% learned new idioms
 Improvements in new iterations

Game available on Google Play

Questions & Contact

References
[1] Mitchell, P., Parsons, S., & Leonard, A. (2007). Using virtual environments for teaching social understanding to
adolescents with autistic spectrum disorders. Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 37(3), 589-600.
[2] Kandalaft, M. R., Didehbani, N., Krawczyk, D. C., Allen, T. T., & Chapman, S. B. (2013). Virtual reality social
cognitiontraining for young adults with high-functioning autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders,
43(1), 34-44.
[3] Boelte, S. (2009). [The ICF and its meaning for child and adolescent psychiatry]. Zeitschrift fur Kinder-und
Jugendpsychiatrie und Psychotherapie, 37(6), 495-497.
[4] Wainer, A. L., & Ingersoll, B. R. (2011). The use of innovative computer technology for teaching social communication to
individuals with autism spectrum disorders. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders, 5(1), 96-107.
[5] Rayner, C., Denholm, C., & Sigafoos, J. (2009). Video-based intervention for individuals with autism: Key questions that
remain unanswered. Research in Autism Spectrum Disor-ders, 3(2), 291-303.
[6] Burckley, E., Tincani, M., & Guld Fisher, A. (2014). An iPad™-based picture and video activity schedule increases
community shopping skills of a young adult with autism spec-trum disorder and intellectual disability. Developmental
neurorehabilitation, (0), 1-6.
[7] Shane, H. C., & Albert, P. D. (2008). Electronic screen media for persons with autism spectrum disorders: Results of a
survey. Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 38(8), 1499-1508.
[8] Sehaba, K., Estraillier, P., and Lambert, D.. Interactive educational games for autistic chil-dren with agent-based system.
In Fumio Kishino, Yoshifumi Kitamura, Hirokazu Kato, and Noriko Nagata, editors, Entertainment Computing -
ICEC 2005, volume 3711 of Lec-ture Notes in Computer Science, pages 422–432. Springer Berlin Heidelberg, 2005.
ISBN 978-3-540-29034-6
[9] Paron-Wildes, A.J.. Sensory Stimulation and Autistic Children. In Implications: A News-letter by Informedesign. Vol. 06
Issue 04, 2007.

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