Academic Project • MIT Institute of Design • Semester 8, 2010.
A research based systems design project conceptualised with a motive to design educational aids for young, children suffering from Dyslexia in India. This game revolves around the concept of teaching Diagraphs and Blends in English.
It works on a multi-sensorial level & uses audio-visual clues to help children learn simple spellings with their correct pronounciations in a fun & active environment.
The project is an attempt at designing play objects that are a source of enjoyment, awareness and learning for children.The game can be a great source of overall development of kids.
This game tries to address or even, to a certain extent, counter the following symptoms:
• Difficulty in reading.
• Understanding letters & their meanings.
• Remembering letters & associating them to their respective forms.
• Following multiple instructions.
• Working on hand & eye coordination.
Existing Education aids for children
WORD WHIRL
This game is designed to help children understand & remember basic spellings using Basic Blends.
BLENDS are 2 or more letters coming together to form a sound egs :ap -cap,nap .
In this set, blends with the vowel A are introduced which are placed on various rotating dials & there are supporting visual, sound & tactile clues to help the child learn simple spellings using those blends.
THE PROCESS:
1. The child throws a pyramid in the air & picks a side based on which surface falls on the ground - just like a common dice [here, it is 4 sides of a tetrahedron with clues].
1. The child throws a pyramid in the air & picks a side based on which surface falls on the ground - just like a common dice [here, it is 4 sides of a tetrahedron with clues].
2. Based on the chosen face of the dice, the player can choose one of the following options:
• VISUAL CARD - with a picture of what the word means egs ; a cat as in C+ AT
• SOUND CARD - the teacher conducting the game will pick up a sound card & spell out the word loud & clear for the children to guess. Since Devanagiri
(Hindi) as a script follows the system of phonetics, each sound card is written in both English & Hindi to avoid any mistakes in the pronounciations of the spellings.
• BLINDFOLD - the child is given any alphabet piece & he/she has to guess it just by touching its contours blindfolded i.e tactile approach to help associate the form of the alphabet with its sound]
• FLUKE - The child scores a point by default & the next player is called.
