pervasive computing applications for science education: recent research advances
DESCRIPTION
Dr Theodoros N Arvanitis Senior Lecturer, Head of Biomedical Informatics, Signals & Systems Research Laboratory, Department of Electronic, Electrical & Computer Engineering Director, Centre for Learning, Innovation & Collaboration University of Birmingham, United Kingdom. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Dr Theodoros N Arvanitis
Senior Lecturer, Head of Biomedical Informatics, Signals & Systems Research Laboratory, Department of Electronic, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Director, Centre for Learning, Innovation & Collaboration
University of Birmingham, United Kingdom
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Pervasive Computing in Education:Pervasive Computing in Education:Realising Our Imagination Realising Our Imagination
"Leave the beaten track occasionally and dive into the woods. Every time you do so, you will be certain to find something that you have never seen before. Follow it up, explore all around it, and before you know it, you will have something worth thinking about to occupy your mind. All really big discoveries are the result of thought."
Alexander Graham Bell: "electrical speech machine" of 1876
What is Pervasive Computing?
Mainframe: many people share one computer
Personal Computer: one person with one computer
Pervasive & Ubiquitous computing: many
computers serve each person Pervasive & Ubiquitous Computing can be thought of as
the idea of invisible computers everywhere. computers are embedded in the environment, each computer performs its tasks without requiring
human awareness or a large amount of human intervention.
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Major Trends in Computing
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Philosophy and Goals of Pervasive & Ubiquitous Computing
Computing paradigm in contrast to the desktop model
Integrate computers into our everyday activities
Computer embodiments in infrastructure have varying size and shapes
Early Steps: Construct, deploy, and evaluate tabs, pads, and boards
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
The Early Steps of Pervasive &Ubiquitous
Computing
The initial incarnation of ubiquitous computing was in the form of "tabs", "pads", and "boards" built at Xerox PARC, 1988-1994.
Mobile Computing Research explore the capabilities and impact of mobile
computers in an office setting Palm-sized mobile computers that can communicate
wirelessly through infrared tranceivers to workstation-based applications.
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Types of Ubiquitous Computing Devices
Tabs small, handheld devices, like Post-it notes, or the spine of a
book must carefully balance display size, bandwidth, processing,
memory, power consumption Pads
paper-sized tablets a number are commercially available, but they are not well-
suited for the generalized requirements of a research environment, which includes high customizability
PARC's MPad used FPGAs, so they can even reprogram their hardware!
Boards intelligent whiteboards, allowing for collaborations, storage,
etc.
Wearables
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Applications of Pervasive & Ubiquitous Computing
Locating people Collaboration tools Environment control Virtual communities Indirect Management
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Wearable Computing in Science Education:
The Challenge Bridging the gap between pedagogy and front-end technology
Introducing innovation in learning and computational tools The Lab of Tomorrow project is a European project primarily
concerned with capturing sensor data from the local environment, for transmission to some control computer or computers. This is then be used for analysis during science school classes (e.g. high-school physics)
Introducing the concept of wearable computational and on-body sensing devices Combining the use of “toys” for activity-based learning An elaborate system of distributed computation, embedded-
sensing devices, positioning calculation, and data analysis.
www.laboftomorrow.org
IST-2000-25076
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Lab of Tomorrow: The Vision
To contribute towards the connection of science with everyday life activities
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
14 Nov 2004 11
Wearable Computing: Our Perspective
A new form of an embedded-computing: Computing paradigm in contrast
to the desktop model Integrating computers into our
everyday activities Wearable (a definition):
Portable while operational On-body, embedded in clothes,
hands-free Sensing the environment Supporting activity in a
ubiquitous manner Always-on (…depending on
energy capacity)
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Wearable Computing: Distributed Embedded Systems
Baber, et al., IBM Systems Journal, Vol 38, No 4, 1999
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
LoT Wearables
CONNECT
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Technological “Societies”: blessing or burden ?
Computer Systems are getting more complex over time Distributed systems present an inherent
complexity in architectural design and in the way information is structured
Overload of information: vast, dynamic or even unstructured information
“Vagueness” of human knowledge More everyday tasks involve computers More users without the necessary skills
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
“Calm Technology”: Pervasive computing
To cope with the “vagueness of human knowledge”, the complexity of systems and the needs created by the new information “pool” it is required that we leave computers in a proximal periphery and focus on “calm technology”
In other words, build technology that gets our attention when we need to use it, but that relegates itself to the background, and stays aside, actively waiting to assist us.
Advanced Technologies in Education, Athens 26-27 January 2007
Mobilearn Architecture
MOBIlearn project presentation – IST-2001-37187
ContextAwarenessSubsystem
ContentServer
Sensors
User inputUser profile
Contentmetadata
Contentrecommendations
XML
XML
XML
XML
XML
Content
Environment
Thank You“The world we have created today has problems which cannot be solved by thinking the way we thought when we created them”
Albert EinsteinAlbert Einstein