Advances in MASELTOV – Serious Games in a Mobile Ecology of Services for Social Inclusion and Empowerment of Recent Immigrants

Abstract

Immigration imposes a range of challenges with the risk of social exclusion. As part of a comprehensive suite of services for immigrants, the MASELTOV game seeks to provide both practical tools and innovative learning services via mobile devices, providing a readily usable resource for recent immigrants. We introduce advanced results, such as the game-based learning aspect in the frame of recommender services, and present the rationale behind its interaction design. Benefits and implications of mobile platforms and emergent data capture techniques for game-based learning are discussed, as are methods for putting engaging gameplay at the forefront of the experience whilst relying on rich data capture and analysis to provide effective learning solutions.Keywords. Mobile serious game, social inclusion, incidental learning framework, recommender system, human factors. Geo-social radar:A volunteer helper service allowing users to find nearby volunteers who can help them with a problem, for example acting as a translator at a doctor's appointment, or negotiating local bureaucracy.TextLens: allows a learner to take a photo of a sign, and have this converted to text. This can then be coupled with a language translation tool such as Google Translate. Images and text can be uploaded for help when the meaning is ambiguous, and if the learner wishes to discuss their social, cultural or legal implications.

Intelligent user interfaces in digital games for empowerment and inclusion

“…Inclusion and Empowerment of Immigrants with Persuasive learning technologies and Social Network Services 5 ) project [6] recognised the major risks for social exclusion of immigrants from the European information society. This project has harnessed the potential of social, situated and opportunistic learning on mobile phones to enhance the social inclusion of immigrants with an intelligent suite of mobile services.…”

“…This project has harnessed the potential of social, situated and opportunistic learning on mobile phones to enhance the social inclusion of immigrants with an intelligent suite of mobile services.  The TARDIS (Training young Adult's Regulation of emotions and Development of social Interaction Skills 6 ) project [1], which aimed to build a scenario-based serious-game simulation platform for young people at risk of exclusion, aged of 18-25, in order to explore, practice and improve their social skills.…”

“…When working with inter-cultural differences [3] and migrants' inclusion [6], it is possible to design applications that help people by training them on a classical task they already know about and could achieve in a different cultural context. Here, the role of the domain expert is not directly to intervene during the use of the system but to provide domain knowledge that will make the difference between a standard application and an intelligent, well-suited game for empowerment and inclusion.…”

“…(v) Progress feedback is a highly relevant pedagogical feature of persuasive learning technologies. (vi) Playful mobile language learning (displayed is a list of lesson chapters with subjective and objective performance records) is innovatively embedded in a framework of a context sensitive recommender service [6,17,20] MASELTOV includes a mixed reality game [7,17] in which the user applies her/his language skills in various situations, such as in dialogues during shopping, or for navigation in the urban environment. The mobile service supports her/him in the situation as well as receives feedback from the user in order to measure or estimate performance.…”

Uma linha de produtos de software orientada a serviços para sistemas de auxílio à visitação de museus

“…Dos estudos filtrados, cinco tratam de sistemas de apoio ao aprendizado de idiomas. O trabalho de Paletta et al (2013) utiliza jogos, auxiliando imigrantes no aprendizado do idioma do país onde moram. Os autores afirmam que um dos objetivos deste jogo, nomeado MASELTOV, é auxiliar tais imigrantes não apenas a aprender o idioma do país onde irão morar, mas também aspectos culturais locais.…”