The department of hidden stories

Abstract

We detail the design of the Department of Hidden Stories (DoHS), a mobile-based game to support playful digital storytelling among primary school children in public libraries. Through a process of iterative design in collaboration with library staff and children's writers we designed DoHS to support the potential for playful storytelling through interactions with books. A deployment of DoHS with two classes of 8 to 10 years olds as part of their regular library visits revealed insights related to how to balance the expectations of a child-at-play and the requirement to further develop their creative reading and writing skills. Based on our experiences we recommend that designers create playful digitally based activities that encourage children to explore libraries and experience new interactions with physical books.

Streets for People

“…While previous work has explored the value of playful engagement in civic spaces such as libraries [68], our study also demonstrated the value of digitally supported roleplay and walks as mediums for children to explore urban issues and participate in transforming their localities. The children were assigned specific responsibilities in their groups, in order to match their preferences and abilities, but also to foster collaboration within the groups.…”

“…Previous work has also investigated how HCI might be able to support children's engagement in civic life [67,68]; however, there remains a need for this work in specific relation to engagement with civic processes such as placemaking. Allied with this, HCI is increasingly recognising the need to 'dig where they stand' and recognise children as "capable social actors" [26:224].…”

Exploring Low-Cost, Internet-Free Information Access for Resource-Constrained Communities

“…Cao et al's TellTable [2010] supported sketch-based storytelling on an interactive table, aiming to encourage incorporating physical objects into stories via 'capture tools' that inserted photos directly on to the story surface. Other approaches have included those of Jacoby and Buechley [2013], who used conductive ink to allow sketches to be augmented with digital content; de Lima et al [2014], who used pen and paper sketches to insert characters into a virtual world; or, Wood et al [2014], whose barcode scanning approach linked digital tales to physical books. Yeh et al's approach [2006] aimed to produce a merged digital version of both Anoto-marked paper notebooks and related photos.…”

PaperChains

“…Other approaches have included those of Jacoby and Buechley [11], who used conductive ink to allow sketches to be augmented with digital content; de Lima et al [15], who used pen and paper sketches to insert characters into a virtual world; or, Wood et al [33], whose barcode scanning approach linked digital tales to physical books. Yeh et al's approach [34] aimed to produce a merged digital version of both Anoto-marked paper notebooks and related photos.…”