Raposo, Miguel, Raquel Barateiro, Susana Martins, Tiago Cardoso, Miguel Palha, and José Barata. "
Improving the Learning of Child Movements Through Games."
International Conference on Serious Games, Interaction and Simulation. Springer, Cham, 2016. 15-22.
AbstractA Developmental Coordination Disorder can be identified when children show motor skills either below the expected levels considered adequate to their physical age or the opportunities provided for their learning. This problem affects four to six percent of school-age children, meaning that, from a very early stage of their life, they have several difficulties to adapt to the daily needs. In order to reduce the impact caused by this disorder, a team of therapists from “ – collected a wide range of exercises that allow the stimulus of several motor areas, including both the Gross and Fine Motor Skills. However, the application of this therapeutics is restricted to regular appointments. Since the motor stimulus, in order to be effective, need continuous application, it was found to be necessary to have a tool that in a practical and affordable way, fulfill this need. Therefore, the proposal presented in this article describes the creation of a systematic collection of such exercises in a friendly user manner for the children to be able to exercise elsewhere.
Lopes, Tiago, Tiago Cardoso, and José Barata. "
Sign Language Support–Adding a Gesture Library to the Leap Motion SDK."
International Conference on Serious Games, Interaction and Simulation. Springer, Cham, 2016. 109-116.
AbstractThere are several research initiatives that tackle gesture recognition. Nevertheless the interaction between the input devices and an application level is still a hard task that has to be accomplished each time a new system is being developed. The objective of this research work is to facilitate that endeavor by introducing a new generic software layer between the gesture capture device and the application level. This layer will provide the introduction of a gesture library and a set of functionalities both to feed this library and pursue gesture recognition afterwards. The objective is to hinder lower-level software/hardware details from a developer towards letting him or her to focus directly at the Application Level. This article presents the created architecture for this new layer. The validation was made using the Leap Motion, at the Sensor Level, and creating a Serious Game devoted to Sign Language exercising, at the Application Level.
Simao, José, Luisa Cotrim, Teresa Condeco, Tiago Cardoso, Miguel Palha, Yves Rybarczyk, and José Barata. "
Using Games for the Phonetics Awareness of Children with Down Syndrome."
International Conference on Serious Games, Interaction and Simulation. Springer, Cham, 2016. 1-8.
AbstractComputers and technology can play a key role in supporting learning, namely for students with special educational needs. Nevertheless, despite the emphasis the society puts on the use of technology and its fast proliferation in the area of education, few initiatives focus on the specific needs of children with disabilities. Motivated by this gap, this research work proposes a computer assisted education application that targets to teach talking and reading through games. The work described herein was carried out in close cooperation with - , a child-care institution that works with children with distinct growth disorders, namely the Down syndrome.