In order to realize the communicative surfaces vision, we propose to design and implement a testbed to enable this HCI research. The testbed will consist of:
For purposes of comparison, display devices based on both rear-projection and LCD flat-panel technology, with a total resolution of approximately 70 million pixels
A wide range of input devices and sensors for novel user interface designs
Computing infrastructure consisting of a PC cluster to drive display and input devices
A software architecture to integrate the technologies and support experimentation
Since our goal is to enable empirical research, we will design the testbed to be rapidly reconfigurable.
The testbed will also be scalable - more LCD panels or stackable rear-projection blocks can be added at any time.
This project applies HCI design methods and theory to the domain of community design, in particular when the object of design is used by a large and diverse audience. We are researching a design methodology based on scenario-based design and implemented as on line collaborative story writing, prioritization, and claims analyses. By leveraging on line technologies a more democratic and extensive user participation seems probable.
As a research and test case, this project supports the Provost's office $8M effort to redesign teaching and learning spaces (classrooms) at Virginia Tech. Visit the VTspace web site to follow the progress of this initiative.
Moore's Law seems to be at work on many display, sensor and network technologies; in the not-too-distant future, almost any surface in the built environment can be an active display surface supporting interaction. Our vision for computing environments of the future is of seemingly boundless interactive visual display space that is integrated into the physical environment. Such large-scale, high-resolution displays can allow users to view and interact with both large-scale patterns and very fine details simultaneously, and to arrange information and resources in new, more effective ways that are not limited by display real estate. The evolution of human-computer interfaces has been constrained, almost by definition, by the limitations of low-resolution visual displays. This is at odds with a person's experience with the real world, which is inherently unbounded and multi-scale. It is important (and necessary) to understand in advance how people will comprehend and maneuver in a world where appearance, meaning and communicated information are digitally and immediately malleable.
This projects seeks to understand how citizens use information technology with each other to participate in civic life (find information, stay informed, discuss issues, form opinions, deliberate); to improve the capability and functionality of information technology to serve the interests and needs of citizens and local government; and to understand how online citizen-to-citizen deliberation links back into local government decision making.
Supporting Knowledge Management and Reuse with LINK-UP
Both researchers and practitioners recognize the importance of effectively capturing and exploiting the lessons learned from information technology research and development activities. Our group examines fundamental challenges to more effectively capture, maintain, and use the intellectual products of interface design through a design process based on the identification of critical parameters, the establishment of scenarios of use, and the discovery of falsifiable hypotheses (or claims) about the psychological effects an interface artifact has on a user. Our work is making this knowledge more available and usable as a resource for science, education, and design practice.
Our efforts to date have focused on the design of notification systems, an emerging class of applications used in multi-tasking situations to stay alerted and informed of interesting, relevant information. Examples of notification systems are prominent both on handheld, wearable, and ubiquitous platforms as well as on standard desktop machines, and include applications such as instant messaging systems, system and user status updates, email alerts, and news and stock tickers. The application of our design processes is resulting in a knowledge repository and toolset that allows users to efficiently classify and search for design knowledge across a broad knowledge base.
Important in our efforts are connections to companies interested in repositories, tools, and processes to assist in design. Feedback from our industry partners helps to direct focus to activities that add real value to software development processes, and the tools and processes that we develop will prove useful to companies interested in structured interface design.
The Scaling Up Simcalc project is a multi-institutional, large-scale, rigorous, controlled test of the potential for educational impact of a pedagogical/technological innovation (SimCalc). It is a challenge to develop technologies with the potential for truly helping students learn difficult material. It is an additional challenge to determine whether those technologies have the potential for widespread impact, given the complex realities of K-12 education. This project has just completed a pilot study of the hypothesis that a wide variety of teachers in Texas can learn to teach with a particular technology (Simcalc) that changes the representational affordances of the math classroom. The pilot study involved 237th grade math teachers from all over Texas. The full 4 year study, to commence in fall 2004, will involve 120 teachers in the first three years and 80 8th grade teachers in the fourth year.
Attentional and Emotional Engagement
URL:
Sponsor:
Contact:
National Science Foundation
Deborah Tatar - tatar@vt.edu
Attentional and Emotional Engagement is a project that examines the impact of different kinds of connectivity on personal and social interactional goals and therefore on cognitive and work outcomes.
Handheld Computers for K-12 Education
URL:
Sponsor:
Contact:
National Science Foundation
Deborah Tatar - tatar@vt.edu
Three projects focused on handheld-wireless connectivity in the course of learning activity are combined under this rubric. NetCalc is a technology and a related pedagogy for teaching the math of change and variation. After a one month-long intervention, repeated with two different classes, 8th grade students completing Algebra 1 showed a statistically significant improvement on qualitative calculus problems taken from the Advanced Placement Calculus exam as well as on more standard algebra problems. WHIRL is a set of three technologies co-designed with K-12 teachers in South Carolina for promoting formative assessment during science learning. Formative assessment is when teachers or students receive information that helps them monitor how well learning is progressing. Such information is then used to change the course of instruction. Handheld Architectures is a project to develop a flexible architecture for connectivity to handle a range of situations inspired by classroom use, in which connectivity is a detail that must not interfere with learning.
TeacherBridge
The School as a Knowing Organization - Knowledge Management as a Strategy for Continuous Teacher Development
The TeacherBridge project, funded by NSF's Research on Learning and Education (ROLE) program, focuses on use of online tools for supporting teacher professional resource management for Montgomery County and Giles County Public School teachers.
:: Center for Human-Computer Interaction at Virginia Tech ::
Contact:
Dr. Francis Quek, Director
Dr. Andrea Kavanaugh, Associate Director
2202 Kraft Drive, KWII Building (0902)
Blacksburg, VA 24060
tel: (540) 231-3188 or 231-1806
fax: (540) 231-9218
