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Ole's Grand Adventure (redirected from Letters From Felix: A Virtual Reality)

Page history last edited by Michelle Brodney 10 years, 3 months ago

The purpose of our project is to digitize children's literature, like "Letters from Felix" and Flat Stanley stories, and expand them, adding multimedia elements, and a fun, interactive feel.  Our project aims to answer the questions:  How will digitizing literature affect the next generation of children?  What is gained and what is lost when a pop-up children's story is converted into a multimedia, interactive webpage?  Ultimately, in designing this project, the "Ole's Grand Adventure" project seeks to recreate these traditional picture books into a webpage for children, to expand their learning toward different cultures as well as increase their competency with different technologies and media.

 

Meet Olé, our little kitten guide and friend, to take us through the project!

Hello there students, friends, and fellow pets! Olé here, world traveler and UCSB alumn, ready to take you on my grand adventure across the globe! Let's get started!

 

https://a.tiles.mapbox.com/v3/mbrodney.g9ao88k9/page.html?secure=1#2/-22.91792293614602/21.26953125

 

In this project, there were a few issues and hiccups that had to be maneuvered around and dealt with.  A huge issue was the minimal amount of editing and customized HTML that could be done on the wordpress site without buying or making payments to the site.  Ideally, there would be an endless supply of money available to the project and thus an endless amount of customization and HTML/CCS coding.  Additionally, the widgets on the Wordpress site were difficult to figure out, and the appearance of the blog often did not match the intent of the creator.

 

 

 

 

Combined Annotated Bibliography:

1. Allan, Cherie. Playing with Picturebooks: Postmodernism and the Postmodernesque. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, New York:  Palgrave Macmillan. 2012.

 

     In Allan’s book, Playing with Picturebooks, she argues that, “Postmodernism has played a significant part in the development of playful and experimental picturebooks for children over the past fifty years”.  Allan argues that the idea of the postmodern and the “postmodernesque”, in addition to affecting much of the adult literature and thought processes of the mid to late 21st century, has also infiltrated the children’s book.  What affect does this have on children growing up within these mindsets?  And, the question that is most pertinent to the “Letters from Felix” project that Playing with Picturebooks may provide a sufficient answer for is, “How does the postmodern affect the digital media and literature that children access daily across the globe?”

            Looking at the history behind children’s books, especially in the last 50 years, will be an essential component to the “Letters from Felix” project because it will help to delineate the differences between different forms of literature, from print to digital. As Allan explains, “[each] chapter discusses how metafictive devices enable different modes of representation, offer different perspectives to authorised versions of history, and promote difference and ex-centricity over unity”.  Ultimately, studying these “different modes of representation” will help in translating the printed “Letters from Felix” story to its soon-to-be created computer webpage counterpart.

 

2. Doughty, Amie A. Throw the Book Away: Reading versus Experience in Children's Fantasy. Jefferson, North Carolina : McFarland & Company, Inc. 2013.

 

     This book explains the relationship between children’s reading and writing and their interaction with the text beyond that.  Throw the Book Away looks at recent children fantasy novels like Harry Potter and Captain Underpants and seeks to see the affect of reading these stories versus interacting with them, like through their film adaptations or video games, on the understanding of children.  Doughty, in her book, stresses the importance of interactive literature, films, and gaming on the education of children and their proficiency with multimedia in an increasingly more technological world.  More than that, she encourages the children to take up the mantel of their favorite heroes and heroines, and like Hermione Granger, move beyond reading and formal education to a place of experience and adventure with their imaginations.

            Furthermore, this book is an excellent resource, in addition to the Playing with Picturebooks source, in translating a pop-up style, printed children’s book into an interactive and multimedia webpage.  Also, in the “Letters from Felix” project, included within the webpage will be printable souvenirs, like a passport, that will enable the children to go through the virtual world of “Letters from Felix” and then interact with the elements from the digital literature within their physical space and realities, thus recreating the space that Doughty creates within her work.

 

3. Hischak, Thomas S. American Literature on Stage and Screen: 525 Works and Their Adaptations. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. 2012.

 

     Although this source does not deal with children’s literature exclusively, it is a valid source for this project because it looks into the differences and similarities between a written work and a performed work.  Within this e-book, as explained by the publisher, “Each literary work is first described and then every adaptation is examined with a discussion of how accurate the version is and how well it succeeds”.  The commentary Hischak provides for specific children’s books, like Where the Wild Things Are and its recent film adaptation, would be a possible way to investigate how different media forms affect a written work and to see how accurate the adaptation is compared to the original source.

            Regarding the “Letters from Felix” project, Hischak’s work is instrumental in carefully studying the children’s literature genre and how accurately the theme, images, and feel of the written work can be translated to the stage, the screen, and even the computer monitor.  It will be interesting to figure out, with the help of Hischak’s work, what is gained and what is lost when a children’s book, like “Letters from Felix” is translated into a virtual, computer world with many multimedia, clickable options rather than a physical copy of the illustrated story. 

 

4. Op de Beeck, Nathalie.  Suspended Animation:  Children's Picture Books and the Fairy Tale     of Modernity. Minneapolis:  University of Minnesota Press. 2010.

 

     In Op de Beeck’s work, she investigates the picture book, specifically in the time period between the two world wars (1910-1940), as a tool for relaying the cultural and historical paradigms in a seemingly simple and easy to read format for children.  As the publisher describes it, “Children's picture books are at once fairy tales that uphold middle-class traditions and modern commodities that teach children about their changing world” and “although they are outwardly earnest and easy to read, picture books express questionable attitudes on ethnic and racial difference, nature and technology, and history and the here and now”.  This is relevant to the “Letters from Felix” project because, in addition to making a digitized version of the story, the project will add relevant cultural, historical, and economical facts about each country that the children’s story may not include in much detail. 

            Above all, by examining the picture book and the ideological frameworks hidden within each story, it is possible to grasp the historical paradigms in each children’s book and investigate how these affect the children’s understanding depending on the time period and historical movement they are in. Op de Beeck’s work, with simply a quick glance over the summary of her work, provides a nuanced and intriguing way of looking at children’s picture books, which is especially applicable into the new millennium and digital age.  As she describes it, Op de Beeck’s work “situates the American picture book and its visual-verbal sequences in the cultural and critical contexts of modernity and the machine age”. 

 

5. Wu, Yan. (Re)imagining the World: Children's Literature's Response to Changing Times. Berlin; New York: Springer. 2013.     

 

     (Re)imagining the World is a thorough and groundbreaking look into the changes undergone by children’s literature through the times.  Within this e-book, Wu prefaces the book saying, “This historical insight reminds us that changes in reading—both in terms of what is read and how it is accessed—have always characterized children’s literature”. 

            In one of the books most poignant statements, Wu describes new imaginations that are surfacing around the world in the minds of children because of new technologies available to them.  Wu states, “Children’s literature around the globe constitutes a grand act of imagining; the books children read, the films they see, and the internet games they play participate in the recreation of the world by providing children with new ways of perceiving the world; they provide children with possible worlds and even impossible worlds.”

            Like many of the other sources, (Re)imagining the World is an excellent resource for the “Letters from Felix” project because it examines “how children’s literature and education in its broadest sense can form creative connections that will enable young people to think beyond limits, to realize the options, and to imagine the kind of life that a prosperous future can hold.”  In this way, the project can benefit from Wu’s readily available electronic book, because it deals directly with the digital humanities, and specifically in regard to children.  Of all the sources, this one seems the most promising because it is directly involved with the children and technology of today and provides an in-depth look into the possible effects digitizing literature will affect the understanding and growth of the next generation of children.

By Andrea

 

 1. Bain, Alan. The learning edge :  what technology can do to educate all children. New York : Teachers College Press, 2012. Print. 

 

In this resource, Alan Bain and his colleague Mark Weston examine the ways in which technology (specifically information and communication technology or ICT in their words) impacts or can impact education. They explore the way that technology can affect both the educators and the students at various levels of education. The authors believe that technology provides really positive and interesting ways for learning to take place, especially in a way that can be collaborative. This resource is great for our project because one of our goals is to take this text and make it more informational, educational, and collaborative/immersive through a technological format. Bain's study is interesting in that it analyzes both educators and students, which in our case could apply to the parents/guardians as educators and the children as students (though parents could also potentially be expanding their own knowledge and become students in the process as well). Another important part of this study is that is studies many levels of education and not just one specific one. This range of educational levels can show how our project can potentially affect children at different levels of education and possibly help to discover which education level our project meshes the best with in order to maximize learning. 

 

 

2. Dill, Karen E., ed. The Oxford handbook of media psychology. New York : Oxford University Press, 2013. Print. 

 

The Oxford Handbook of Media Psychology explores different aspects of media and the impact they have on the way someone acts, thinks, and feels. The different aspects span from media violence and desensitization to said violence, sexual content, video game violence, portrayals of race and gender, and most importantly in this case children's media use. They further study physical/heath effects experienced from exposure to certain medias and the occurrence of technological addictions. This resources applies to our project because of our focus on a children's work that we are reinterpreting into something that is digital and multimedia. The study provides a look at the impacts that this action that we take could have on a child's development. A child's development is critical as it is a time where they can be heavily molded and influenced. Actions, thoughts, and emotions can all be part of this development and knowing how technology is impacting these things and in a broader sense a child's development is something that is extremely important to look at since these impacts could stretch way past childhood. Again, a question arises about our project in connection with this work: will changing a traditional physical book into this multimedia virtual reinterpretation negatively affect the way a child acts, thinks, feels, and possibly develops as a person? 

 

 

3. Gardner, Howard. The app generation : how today's youth navigate identity, intimacy, and imagination in a digital world. New Haven : Yale University Press, 2013. Print. 

 

Howard Gardner and his colleague Katie Davis explore the relationship between the current day youth and technology. Their work explores the phenomenon of how young people have developed a relationship with technology, what this relationship means, and the consequences of such a relationship. As the title states, the authors analyze technology and the impact it has on identity, intimacy, and imagination. The authors compare the negatives and positive that these technological relationships and dependency. These findings appear to be both opposing and yet stable in their own ways. For example, this can be shown through the results of the studies that find that technology can both “stunt creative imagination” and “stimulate creativity.” This resource parallels with our project in that it explores the relationship of young people and technology which we are interested in learning more about as a group. In transforming and reinterpreting this text into a virtual online format we are playing into this technology/youth relationship that Gardner and Davis studied. Of particular importance is the fact that the authors examined the specific impact that technology has on a person's ability to imagine or imagination as whole. The intimacy aspect, though not one that we had talked about as explicitly as imagination, can also apply to our project as well due to the fact that children's books are traditionally read by a guardian/parent to the child. The study begs a question of our own work: will our reinterpretation be part of the technology that stunts or encourages creative imagination? 

 

 

 

4. Mullenweg, Matt. WordPress. Web. 5 Nov 2013. 

 

WordPress (http://wordpress.com/) is a blogging website that allows users to create and mediate their own blogs. Though the site/program has premium features that cost extra, it is technically free which makes it extremely accessible to anyone with an internet connection and/or computer. A key feature is the ability to publicize your blog through other websites and social networks, therefore expanding your audience and extending the information out further into the world. This resource is particularly important because it might potentially serve as the base of the entire project as we are mirroring a book or genre of book through a blog/virtual reality format. With this resource, the group is able to express our reinterpretations through multimedia (text, audio, photo, video, etc), which is fairly vital because it aids in creating a more extensive and immersive version of a physical book. The ability to add tags to each of these different types of medias is also a great way to help organize each country or category of information, which is not only helpful to the site administrators but also to site visitors who want to further their knowledge on a subject they found particularly captivating. The latter is also something that you cannot really accomplish in a physical book, or at least not in the same way.

  

 

5. WorldMap. Center for Geographic Analysis at Harvard University, 2011.  Web. 5 Nov 2013.

 

WorldMap (http://worldmap.harvard.edu/ ) is a resource that allows the user to “explore, visualize, edit, collaborate with, and publish geospatial information.” With this application, the user can create their own map that can adhere to their own specifications. The user can choose different types of layouts with which to lay as the base for whichever area is being explored. Once this base has been established, the user can add different layers that add to information displayed or which emphasize whatever the user would like to emphasize. The resource even allows information like statistics and data sets to be uploaded and overlapped on the maps as well. Another interesting feature is the ability to link to a flickr account. The feature is a way to take something that can be seen as very methodological and precise and instead make it more personal, which can lead to a more emotional connection to whatever the map is displaying. Though WorldMap may not seem to be the best choice for our project since it may not be particularly child-friendly or appealing, the abilities that it seems to possess provide an interesting platform that is worth exploring. The fact that our text is based off of traveling across the entire world and exploring each of these unique places links quite well with this application. The ability to layer and expand information about a specific place with this application is one of the main purposes of this project: taking a children's book and reinterpreting it with a more scholarly point of view. While we also aim to keep it child-friendly, this expansion of information is also vital and this resource has the potential to aid in such types of informational expansion. 

By Brianna

 

1.Thompson, Asha, Brianna Barriga, Andrea Liedloff, Nathalie Vera, Tiffany Park, Kelley Oorloff, and Michelle Ann. "Lettersfromfelix2013." Letters from Felix. English 149, 5 Nov. 2013. Web. 06 Nov. 2013. <http://lettersfromfelix2013.wordpress.com/wp-admin/>.

Wordpress is the site we will be using for our project. This site allows all of us to edit material, choose the background, colors and style of our blog. This blog will have a map of the world and allow users to navigate through all of the six countries we have choosen. From there users will have the opportunity to learn about the country’s culture, economic and political information. Wordpress gives us the freedom to choose what we want and how it will be displayed.

 

2."Kids and the Internet."Kids and the Internet. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Nov. 2013. <http://www.nap.edu/netsafekids/inter_kids.html>.

This article insights its readers as to why the Internet is an advantage and does not hinder children. Giving them access to many tools, the Internet is seen as a benefit and can give them many resources. While there are many problems with children and the internet, parents can protect what they explore and what they learn. The Internet allows for so many people to learn about many things as well as socialize and for entertainment purposes. Instead of having kids be restricted to books and newspapers, they have the opportunity to learn about the world right at their fingertips.

 

3."Kids and the Internet - It's a Good Thing."The Christian Science Monitor. The Christian Science Monitor, 20 July 2005. Web. 04 Nov. 2013. <http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0720/p09s02-coop.html>.

Digital skills empower children to learn about many things. It gives them access to worldwide information, helps them with research for projects and gives them the opportunity to communicate and self-express themselves. Children now have the tools to learn a wide variety of information with just a click of a button. Children of this generation have the opportunities that previous generations did not. Staying connected with friends for social reasons to learning information, the Internet does not hinder but gives them the tools they need to gain a vast amount of knowledge.

 

4.Livingstone, Sonia. "Children's Use of the Internet: Reflections on the Emerging Research Agenda."Sage Journals(20012): n. pag. Web. 03 Nov. 2013. <http://nms.sagepub.com/content/5/2/147.abstract>.

The internet allows children and young people to emerge and use it as a researching tool. It allows them to communicate and participate with different aspects of the internet. As technology emerges, young people are immersed with it and the opportunities it provides. Education and learning is a very important aspect of the internet and there are many opportunities that the internet provides. While there are many dangers with the internet, children are participating and finding their own idenity.

 

5.Beard, Marisa. "Internet Offers Benefits to Children and Classroom Teachers."WIU. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Nov. 2013. <http://www.wiu.edu/thecenter/articles/benefits.html>.

Incorpoating the internet in a classroom setting offers a vast amount of information. Incorporating real life experiances with lectures, not only makes the classroom setting interesting, but allows children to learn more with all that the Internet offers. Having children from different parts of the world learn about other students in complete opposite areas in the world is difficult in a classroom setting, but with the help of the internet these children can learn about the world with just a click of a button. With tours, museums, stores and many other information, children can learn about places and people as a while or on their own. Children also learn how to write emails, to each other, to their teacher and to their family. Not only getting experience with using the internet, chidren can print it out and use it as a resource. Teachers can also use the internet when they don’t have an answer to a question. With online sites made safe for them, they have the opportunity to explore.

By Kelley

 

Wiburg, Karin, and Barbara Rader. "Computers Are Elementary." The Arithmetic Teacher 31.5 (1984): 18-22. Print. 

  

     This text is an analysis of the ways in which computers and technology can be effectively used as aids for learning in classrooms as early as the second grade. The text briefly summarizes techniques and the essentials for preparing a child to use technology as a learning tool, as well as how to follow up to measure progress properly. Computers Are Elementary will be useful in my group’s media project, because our goal is to determine the ways in which technology and visual media can alter one’s interpretation of a particular text. More specifically, by looking at a children’s book, we hope that providing visual media alongside research and text will not only alter interpretation, but make it more comprehensive and useful for young children who are reading the book with our digital resource as an accompaniment. Further, Computers Are Elementary is a valuable text for this project, because it does not simply or objectively suggest that technology in the classroom has an effect; but rather, that allowing children as young as 6 or 7 years old to use computers in addition to reading traditional books produces positive results, as long as the proper preparation and follow up are performed. 

 

Thompson, Asha, Brianna Barriga, Andrea Liedloff, Nathalie Vera, Tiffany Park, Kelley Oorloff, and Michelle Ann. "Lettersfromfelix2013." Letters from Felix. English 149, 5 Nov. 2013. Web. 06 Nov. 2013. <http://lettersfromfelix2013.wordpress.com/wp-admin/>. 

  

     This resource is our group’s blog which can be found on Wordpress.com, and which will contain our geographical and cultural research surrounding the travels of the blog’s title character, Felix. The benefit of using Wordpress over another blog website is the presence of HTML editing tools, which allow users to customize their pages down to the style of text and background color. Further, our site on Wordpress is editable and any time and by multiple users, meaning that it will be accessible to all of our group’s members for editing in the event that anything needs to be added or changed, and also that if we decide to go forward with our project as a teaching tool, we will all be able to add more information and access it. The blog itself will be designed like a map, with seven clickable cities for our users to explore and learn more about. Our main character, whose name will most likely change during the course of our project’s development, will have “traveled” to each of these cities, and information about each location will be presented from our protagonist’s point of view. Not only will the blog provide information about the culture that informs each of the cities, but also information about the cities geographical location and characteristics, such as other cities it is close to, the weather, and the countries in which each of the cities are located. 

 

Sapek, Artur, Emily Hsia, Andy Kim, and Cheng-Tao Chu. Codecademy. Codecademy. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Nov. 2013. <http://www.codecademy.com/tracks/htmlcss>. 

  

     This resource is a web tool that teaches beginners how to properly write HTML and CSS, in a step-by-step, hands-on series of lessons, beginning with simple text encoding language and ending with actual coding that includes color, font, size, and layout. The tool is helpful because it does not only provide information about HTML and CSS, or give users of the tool the opportunity to practice the skills they have just learned – but mainly because the tool will not let you advance on to the next lesson automatically if you have not properly completed the lesson before it. While you are allowed to move ahead manually, it is valuable to follow the lessons as they appear and are presented to you, because this way you can build a basic and essential foundation of knowledge of text encoding that will stick with you. This tool is valuable because it will give all of our project group’s members an opportunity to learn the basics of text encoding quickly, so that we are all able to edit our blog website. The platform site for our blog page offers a wide variety of premade layouts, but this Codecademy HTML and CSS text encoding “crash course” will allow us to steer clear of those premade layouts and, subsequently, any copyright infringement issues, as we build our own web tool for children from the ground up, using the images and text that we want. Further, this is a useful tool because it would allow us to take the webpage entirely off of the Wordpress platform if we ever decided to do so one day. 

 

Donaldson, Sadie, and Iris Donaldson. "Technology Essential to Children's Success, Professor Says." Phys.org. Phys.org, 16 Jan. 2013. Web. 5 Nov. 2013. <http://phys.org/news/2013-01-technology-essential-children-success-professor.html>. 

  

     This article can be found on the Phys.org website, which is described as “a leading web-based science, research and technology news service which covers a full range of topics”, and more specifically, the sciences of physics, earth, medicine, nanotechnology, electronics, space, biology, chemistry, computers, engineering, math, and as one can deduce from this article, children and child development. This article by Sadie and Iris Donaldson is one of the most essential resources for my group’s blog project, because it makes a case for the significance of technology and more specifically, handheld devices, tablets, and computers in general for the educational and scholarly advancement of young children. The article states that if parents would like to secure a bright future for their child, it is essential that the child be provided with resources that will become even more important as the child gets older. The article takes the stance that we are hoping to prove with our research: that if guided and monitored correctly, children using technology can provide a better-rounded and comprehensive collection of knowledge and information, that will not only supplement but enhance regular reading. Part of the argument of our group’s project is also that the addition of visual and media elements to a traditional children’s story may change the meaning and interpretation of that story, and this article’s argument that children using technology prepares them for the future supports that claim by suggesting that learning is a social activity for children, while reading alone can often be an isolated activity, while using the computer, a tablet, or some other type of technology that allows you access the web is a more interactive way of learning that will connect the student to limitless resources, friends, and opportunities. 

 

Johnson, Steven. "How the E-Book Will Change the Way We Read and Write." The Wall Street Journal (2009): n. pag. 20 Apr. 2009. Web. <http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB123980920727621353>. 

  

     This article is an analysis of the ways in which technology, and in particular e-books – or electronic versions of books – will negatively affect our generation’s collective experience of reading, not only with regards to the information we receive but the experience of reading a book that you can hold in your hands, as opposed to reading off of a handheld tablet or computer screen. The article details the perils of being “too connected”, or losing the excitement and suspense of reading a real book because we electronic text resources make it too easy to skip to the end, or give away certain things, or even read too fast and lose some of the meaning in that way. The author compares the rising popularity of digital reading resources to the invention of the printing press, in the sense that both technological advancements allowed for a faster and wider spread of new ideas. This resource is essential to my group’s project, because it makes a claim that we are trying to eliminate. While it is true that online interaction and digital media can change the way that we interpret a text, these tools are also valuable to our understanding of the text, making it more comprehensive and even more interesting. We argue that adding imagery and interactive play to regular text will enhance one’s ability to connect with the text, as opposed to lessening that connection, as Johnson argues in this article.

By Asha

 

1. Houston, Cynthia. "Digital Books for Digital Natives." Children & Libraries: The Journal of the Association for Library Service to Children. 9.3 (2011): 39-42. Academic Search Complete. Web. 4 Nov. 2013.

 

     Technology has brought upon growth and development new challenges, and with it a new terminology.  Digital Natives, according to Cynthia Houston are defined as children born after 1980 who from birth have experienced the digital world as a natural part of their daily lives and regularly access rich resources in digital format for information and entertainment.  Though the main changes have been in communication via Facebook and Twitter, the increasing digitization of information means that print media is no longer the sole source of reading materials available to Digital Natives.  This population of readers expects personalized and relevant information to be instantly available whenever and wherever they need it, meaning that digital books must be easily accessible and user-friendly. 

     According to Houston, digital resources as a type of media have unique characteristics that affect how both children and adults are able to use them.  High-quality digital resources are visually rich and contain beautiful pictures, illustrations, or graphic design elements.  Often they are filled with a convergence of media types, allowing the audience to understand the multiple layers of meaning in a piece of literature.  Because of this, digital books can be highly connective, interactive, and nonlinear in their structure. 

     Most importantly, the entire digital design governing how children interact with these materials must be considered.  Children see and experience the world differently than adults.  Their ability to use technology differs widely because each child develops skills and abilities at a different rate.  The problem is, however, that many digital children’s collections are not designed with children in mind.  Studies indicate that children hunt for books on the basis of how the books make them “feel.”  Also, colors and covers also attract children to particular books.  

 

 

2. Huang, Yeuh-Min, Tsung-Ho Liang, Yen-Ning Su, and Nian-Shing Chen. "Empowering Personalized Learning with an Interactive E-book Learning System for Elementary School Students."Education Technology Research & Development 60.4 (2012): 703-22. Academic Search Complete. Web. 4 Nov. 2013.

 

     In this study, an Interactive E-book Learning System (IELS) was developed for elementary school students in the study.  The interactive principles in multimedia learning were adopted to empower students’ personalized learning experiences with e-books.  Two investigations were conducted: 1) to evaluate the usability and functionality of the developed system and the feedback from the students 2) to evaluate the learning effect of the developed system. 

     Younger generations have different expectations and behaviors towards the use of digital media due to the new technology throughout their childhood development.  Due to this, it is important to take new approaches to teaching children, whether it is reading or math.  Coyle pointed out that the present e-book industry is aimed primarily at how to digitize printed works rather than how to develop and use the new technology to support learning. 

     Results showed that using an e-book or printed book made no significant difference to the student’s reading accuracy; however, the learning process tracking technique of IELS can provide detailed logs about the actual learning processes which can be used by the system to provide further assistance to an individual learner.  A tailored e-book learning system could achieve a better personalized learning experience for elementary school students.  

 

 

3. Hughes-Hassell, Sandra, and Ernie J. Cox. "Inside Board Books: Representations of People of Color." Library Quarterly 80.3 (2010): 211-30. Academic Search Complete. Web. 4 Nov. 2013.

 

     Since my team’s project revolves around creating a virtual reality of a children’s book that revolves around travelling the world and seeing different viewpoints, I thought this article was relevant.  The article begins by saying that research suggests that exposure to books and other resources about people who look like them, and stories that reflect their world, may contribute to an infant and toddler of color’s developing appreciation of self. 

     The study was a study of board books and the effects of interactions with board books with infants.  According to the study, board books help build a toddler’s vocabulary and aid in understanding language through naming and pointing.  These books are especially designed for infants and toddlers and are constructed of heavy cardboard stock and covered with a washable, glossy surface to withstand teeth, sticky fingers, etc.  The text is meant to be simple. 

     The project we are trying to create it aimed toward giving exposure of culture and diversity to children.  The study shows that despite the increasing ethnic and racial diversity in the United States, board books/children books that feature people of color remain a rarity.  For this reason, it may be important to implement this into our digital format.  

 

 

4. Lysaker, Judith T., and Angela Miller. "Engaging Social Imagination: The Developmental Work of Wordless Book Reading." Journal of Early Childhood Literacy. 13.2 (2013): 147-74. Academic Search Complete. Web. 4 Nov. 2013.

 

     This study questioned children’s use of social imagination visible in wordless book reading, and if so, what it looks like and how it might give the audience a more detailed in-process view of the reader-text transaction.  Reading processes and reading development have been addressed but less is known about how reading influences other aspects of children’s development, specifically the development of social imagination. 

     Results suggest that the use of social imagination is observable in wordless book reading and that it is an integral part of the comprehension of stories.  From this the study posits that through vicarious engagement with others, the process of reading my influence the relational capacity for social imagination.

     This is applicable to our project because our study is going to use various techniques in media to convey as much information to a child or an adult as possible.  In addition to doing individual research on a country to write about, there will be visual aid in which children or adults will have the opportunity to watch videos to accompany the adventure that Felix goes on and for the adults to see the political and economic implications in each country so that they may gain the same understanding together.  

 

 

5. Prior, Lori A., Angeli Willson, and Miriam Martinez. "Picture This: Visual Literacy as a Pathway to Character Understanding." Reading Teacher 66.3 (2012): 195-206. Academic Search Complete. Web. 4 Nov. 2013.

 

     The most important piece of information I gained from this article: “Readers must thoughtfully attend to both sign systems – the visual as well as the verbal – to deeply understand the characters.”

     Visual information in picture books for younger children played a dominant role in the development of character traits, interests, and emotions.  This means that picture books must attend not only to the words of stories, but also visual information if they are to understand the characters they meet in picture books.  This is key: meet.  The children’s reading the book is not just an act of reading but an experience of meeting the character and developing an environment around it in which the child should be able to fully understand and absorb.  With this being said, it is important that our project takes on this approach and makes sure to implement some sort of visual aid, whether it be drawings, photographs, or videos. 

     After the little research that I did, I must conclude that struck me is that taking literature and developing it into digital format is not a form of translation, but a form of creating a new story all over again in a whole new realm.  There is no such thing as translation in this business because the two platforms are so utterly different that there is no choice but to change it all entirely to format it to fit it the best way to convey the same meaning as the initial source.  

By Tiffany

 

 

"How Is Technology Affecting Our Kids?" Likes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Nov. 2013.

            <http://likes.com/tech/how-is-technology-affecting-our-kids>

 

The citation above is actually a blog type website that uses many different media forms discussing the change in generations and their learning mechanisms.  The new generation has access to a very different way of learning, one that many adults could not imagine.  At the tip of their fingertips they can gain information instantly.  This blog literally says, “Your child has the advantages that no generation before them did. The world is literally like an open book for them.” This site is relevant to our research due to its belief about the advantages that technology gives to the young generation.  In particular, it discusses how technology now allows for children to be able to literally see what things all over the world actually look like.  It leaves them with no question or wonder as to the actual real life image of a country looks like.  “While just 100 years ago children would listen to stories and dream up what a certain country looked like, you can now show them just what that thing looks like. So they no longer have to wonder what the jungles of Africa or the Dead Sea look like.”  It later says that this can be a great tool for our youth, and is something that, “if you can teach them how to use it to their best advantage.”  This is especially important to our research because the whole purpose of our project is to allow for children to have a useful digital tool that can expand their knowledge, rather than limiting them to a simple 2 dimensional childrens book.  The only thing that might not work about this site is its very minimal in terms of actual examples of how to make technology a useful tool, and not something that parents/teachers should shy away from.  Like it doesn’t give specific sites/digital tools that can offer a student knowledgable information; because we know everyone knows about Google, but there are no specifics.  So overall, this source gives good support and understanding of our purpose of our project, however it doesn’t allow for actual examples.

 

Rowan, Cris. "The Impact of Technology on the Developing Child." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 29 May 2013. Web. 06 Nov. 2013.

 

The Source above is a journal entry from the Huffington Post that discusses the limiting features that technology has on our youth, and child development.  It states that technology actually “fractures its very foundation, and causing a disintegration of core values that long ago were the fabric that held families together.”  It offers statistics of how many children have televisions in their rooms, as well as, how much time children spend in front of a screen of some sort or another.  Stating that children now rely on technology as a majority of their play; which is damaging to the creative and physical growth for a child.  A perfect quote from this source is: “Children's developing sensory, motor, and attachment systems have biologically not evolved to accommodate this sedentary, yet frenzied and chaotic nature of today's technology. The impact of rapidly advancing technology on the developing child has seen an increase of physical, psychological and behavior disorders that the health and education systems are just beginning to detect, much less understand.” The site offers charts that actually illustrate the building blocks for proper child development.  All and all, its main point/argument is to point out the faults that technology has on our youth, and how it actually disconnects them from society.  This is very important for our research because it allows us to see the common thought on how technology is viewed by the older generation, not only that but it also gives us as a project group things to keep in mind when creating this digital version of a childrens book.  In other words, make it so it does not harm the process of a proper child development.  It can be our goal to actually create a source that will be a powerful tool for a child development, rather than harm it.

 

Doughty, Amie A. Throw the Book Away: Reading versus Experience in Children's Fantasy. Jefferson, NC: McFarland &, 2013. Print.

 

"Children's literature is an excellent way to educate children, on everything from social behavior and beliefs to attitudes toward education itself. A prevalent aspect of children's literature is the importance of books and reading. In children's literature, books represent adult authority" (Publishers Summary-back of book). In this actual print book, that is available at the UCSB library, it discusses the importance of childrens books in the development in childrens education.  The only real reason I chose this source is mainly because it is an actual print book that expresses the importance of childrens books.  Which for our project it is important that we stay true to the value of a childrens book, while adding to it to make it a more well-rounded, and knowledgable, experience for the child.  Our goal is not to lose the essence of childrens book and all that it offers a child; we want to expand on it.  The concept of technology and education is a tricky and contreversial issue within society.  It is argued constantly whether it is good or bad for child development.  So it is important for our group to remember to keep the fantasical nature that childrens books offer in order for proper creative development, and I believe this book could actually help us keep the concept of childrens books alive within our digital project.

 

DeRuy, Emily. "Tech Toy Companies like LeapFrog Aim to Teach Reading « Education « Politics & Gov « Peninsula Press." Tech Toy Companies like LeapFrog Aim to Teach Reading « Education « Politics & Gov « Peninsula Press. Peninsula Press, 3 Apr. 2012. Web. 06 Nov. 2013.

           

            In this source, it is similar to the others; however, it is a blog on the specific technological device known as Leapfrog.  Leapfrog is a childrens teaching device that creates new and inovative ways for children to learn and develop.  They have tablets, games, and much more, all in hopes to help a child learn and develop.  Leapfrog is probably one of the first companies to use technology in a way that actually helps the development of young children from the ages of 2-6 successfully.  While keeping the whimsical aspects of childrens books, and combining it with technology that will appeal to this technological generation.  The blogger commentates on the success that Leapfrog can bring and how it can be a useful tool to a childrens learning, if used properly.  “The key, she argues, is using technology as a supplement to and not a substitute for interaction with parents and the other people around them.”  This is a very useful resource only because it demonstrates the value that technology has on our youth, and rather than being afraid of it we must find ways to use it as a supplement. This is a great source for our project in that it agrees with many of our beliefs and goals of our project.  However, although it agrees it still does lack any physical source for our project, in terms of digital tools.  But it is a good source in terms of research.

 

"Create and Publish Interactive Maps." Map Creator Online to Make a Map with Multiple Color Pins and Regions. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Nov. 2013.

           

            This source is an excellent digital tool.  “Our goal at ZeeMaps is to provide you with the simplest mechanisms to create your own customized maps with minimal effort. We give you options such as crowd-sourcing map data, or directly uploading and synchronizing from spreadsheets. You can use maps created with ZeeMaps in the myriad ways that people have traditionally used maps, or put them to more innovative use with the new technology and all that it entails, e.g., get a visceral sense of location data, convey geographical reach to colleagues, friends, customers, search through a prospects list, and so forth. We provide you with the technology to create maps — what you do with it is up to you.” (website intro) It allows for you to create your own digital map, while adding links, pins and images.  The best part as well, is it is free, and seems to be an easy to use tool for people of any kind of computer skills.  I have yet to actually use it to create our virtual map that our group plans to make, however I saw examples and it seems it would be a useful tool.  Hopefully our project isn’t too complex for this software, however, it seems it could be very useful and exactly the kind of tool that we may need for our project.  What may be an issue is the concept of keeping it whimsical, and this map generator may be too advanced, or not visually appealing for young kids.  However this tool is definitely something we should keep in mind.

 

Mapbox.com

 

            This was the site we used to create our map.  The site allows for you to create your own map, personalize it as well as add links to the markers.  This was perfect because it allowed us to put all of our sitess together onto one page.  One thing though is it takes awhile to update any changes you make to the map.

 

By Michelle

 

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