Loe raamatut: «Serious applications of technology in games and health», lehekülg 6

Agradecimientos

El trabajo presentado en este documento hace parte del proyecto No.125174455451, titulado “Apoyo a la Terapia de Rehabilitación del Lenguaje Oral y Escrito en Niños con Discapacidad Auditiva”, financiado por el Departamento Administrativo de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación (COLCIENCIAS) de la República de Colombia.

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Proposal of a videogame as a support for dyscalculia therapies in educational environments

Gabriel Elías Chanchí G.^†16, Yenny Magaly Castrillón B.¹⁷, Luis Freddy Muñoz S.¹⁸

Abstract

One of the relevant problems in the educational context regarding the learning process in the area of mathematics is dyscalculia. In order to apply more effectively and playfully the exercises and/or therapies performed to the subjects with this condition, in this article we present as a contribution the construction of an educational video game to support dyscalculia disorder in the classroom. To facilitate the portability of the game and the use in different activities by professors and professionals in the area, it was decided to use portable and open hardware and software platforms, such as Raspberry PI and Java. Therefore, the proposed game aims to support the development of exercises and/or therapies in the classroom in order to improve the skills in association of numbers and quantities, as well as basic operations of addition and counting.

Keywords: Dyscalculia, rehabilitation, therapies, video game.

Introduction

According to the American Psychiatric Association (De La Peña & Bernabéu, 2018), dyscalculia is classified as a specific learning disorder characterized by difficulty in acquiring skills in the area of mathematics, affecting the development and performance of individuals in this discipline, but does not produce a disorder of general mental functions (De La Peña & Bernabéu, 2018; Landerl, Bevan & Butterworth, 2004); however, behaviors among people with dyscalculia tend to vary. A common feature are the limited capacities to recognize magnitudes, which is evidenced by the fact that these subjects do not write and name numbers correctly, have difficulty performing sequential series, confuse mathematical signs, present problems in subitization; show low level of transcoding between words of numbers, digits and quantities; and have difficulty solving simple arithmetic operations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and counting. According to studies, these behavioral deficits are independent of the level of intelligence and the school environment (Martínez, Calzadilla & Cruz, 2017; Kadosh & Walsh, 2007).

It is estimated that dyscalculia affects between 3 and 7% of school-age children, depending on the country of study and the diagnostic criteria used (Martínez, Calzadilla & Cruz, 2017); the possible causes are attributed to different factors, such as the lack of cerebral communication involving the visual processing and language centers, also related to hereditary conditions, while others consider that it is caused by environmental toxins (Martínez, Calzadilla & Cruz, 2017). Despite there is no doubt that this learning disorder generates a negative impact on the life of the individual who suffers it, it is less recognized, understood and studied by the scientific community with respect to other neurodevelopmental disorders (Beddington et al., 2008; Gersten, Clark & Mazzocco, 2007). Therefore, this paper proposes as a contribution the construction of a video game to support the development of therapies for dyscalculia in educational environments, taking up a set of activities and/or exercises of numerical association and counting, which are presented as challenges within the game. It was developed in the Java programming language, using the components provided by the Swing graphical library, with the intention to be deployed in a portable device type SBC (Single Board Computer) to be used permanently in a classroom of an educational institution, in such a way that it serves as a constant support in the work of teaching in the area of mathematics in basic primary education. In this sense the Java language has been chosen for its compatibility with open platforms such as Raspberry PI. The rest of the paper is organized as follows: section two, presents the methodology considered for the construction of the video game; section three, describes its functional design, as well as the final prototype developed; section four presents the usability inspection performed on the final prototype of the game; and finally, section five presents the conclusions and future work obtained from this research.

Methodology

For the development of the proposed video game, an adaptation of the phases of the design thinking methodology was used (Serrano & Blázquez, 2015). In this way, the following phases were considered: empathize and define, devise, prototype and test (Figure 1). In phase one, the different concepts related to dyscalculia were identified and a set of exercises and/or activities used in the therapies of this disorder were explored. In phase two, a high-level design of the video game was made, taking into account the exercises explored and defined in phase one. In phase three, a prototype of the game designed in the previous phase was developed, making use of the Java programming language. Finally, in phase four, a usability inspection was carried out on the prototype, making use of the video game heuristics proposed by Pinelle, Wong & Stach (2008).

Figure 1.

Considered methodology

Source: the authors.

Construction of the video game

In this section the design and implementation of the proposed video game are presented, which aims to support the development of dyscalculia therapies in educational environments. In terms of design, high-level interfaces and a flowchart are presented, which show its functionality. In terms of implementation, the interfaces of the final prototype generated by the Java programming language are presented, with support from the Swing library.

Video game design

Starting from the problem of dyscalculia and considering the typical exercises used in conventional therapies, related to the use of numerical association activities, arithmetic and counting operations, an interface organized in three tabs was proposed in the design phase, each of which includes a specific exercise. In tab one of the video game, a numerical association activity is included, where the player must feed the monkey with the number of bananas indicated on the label “number to hit”. The intention of this activity is to allow the player to relate the concept of number with the quantity it represents, making use of an example of the real context.

Within activity one, as the user drags the bananas towards the monkey, the application indicates the number of remaining bananas of the 10 initial ones. When the user presses the “Verify” button, the application checks whether the objective was met or not, in such a way that if it is not met the game is restarted; similarly, within activity one the player can start the game again at any time by pressing the “Restart” button. The high-level interface that represents the aforementioned is presented in Figure 2 and was made in the online tool for generating mockups: NinjaMock (Mutis, 2016).

Figure 2.

Activity one

Source: the authors.

In the same way, in the activity two the intention is that players improve their abilities as for the counting and the addition of numerical quantities; for this, the player must select from an abacus the amounts required to count up to a random number generated by the application. In this way, if the number generated randomly is seven, the user must move seven units in the abacus, allowing to count and add quantities at the same time. Finally, activity three aims to improve the skills of a player to count using hands to a number between 1 and 10; thus, once the application has generated and displayed a random number, the player must press the “Count” button until the representation made with the hands coincides with the number generated by the application. When the user presses the “Verify” button, the application checks if the objective was met or not, in such a way that if it is not met the game restarts. Figure 3, shows the high-level interface of activity two generated by the NinjaMock online tool.

Figure 3.

Activity three

Source: the authors.

Source: the authors.

Similarly, in Figure 4 is presented the flow diagram that describes the logic of interaction between the user and the different activities of the video game. As can be seen, when the player launches the game the system displays activity one, in which a random number between 1 and 10 is presented by default; then, the user must drag as many bananas as the random number indicates. Subsequently, the user can verify the fulfillment of the exercise to give continuity with activity two; once the player accesses, the system generates and displays a random number on the screen, which must be represented by the user through adding and counting operations performed with the abacus. When verifying the fulfillment of the exercise, the user can continue with activity three. When the user accesses activity three, the system generates and displays a random number between 1 and 10, which must be represented with both hands presented on the screen. Once the exercise is finished, activity three can be considered completed, thus culminating the activities proposed by the game. It is worth mentioning that the different activities are presented through a panel of tabs.

Implementation of the video game

Taking into account that the idea of the proposed game is to work in a fixed way in an educational institution, the Java programming language was chosen, considering its compatibility with the operating systems supported by the SBC devices. In this sense, it is intended to use a Raspberry PI board with an external screen, a keyboard and a mouse as external peripherals. Then, the intention of the game is to support the activities carried out by the teachers of mathematics in the classroom or in the therapies performed by psychologists in educational institutions. Figure 5 presents the proposal for the deployment of the video game within the educational institution using the Raspberry PI platform.

Figure 5.

Deployment of the video game

Source: the authors.

In the same way, in Figure 6 the main interface of the game is presented, which corresponds by default with the tab of activity one; the player must move to the right 5 of the 10 bananas available on the left side. This exercise seeks to appropriate the relationship between the concept of number and the quantity that represents it.

Figure 6.

Interface activity one

Source: the authors.

In Figure 7 the interface of activity two is presented, which includes on the left an abacus with a variable number of elements in each of its rows, in order to allow a better exercise of the counting operations according to a random number generated by the game. Thus, the player must count from the different rows of the abacus a total of 10 elements to match the number generated by the system and presented on the right side of the interface.

Figure 7.

Interface activity two

Source: the authors.

Finally, in Figure 8 the interface of activity three of the game is presented, which shows on the left a representation of the right and left hands, by means of which it is necessary to count up to the number presented to the right of the interface; thus, the player must count to three to match the number generated by the system. This exercise allows to improve the skills to count on the hands on the part of the users with dyscalculia.

Figure 8.

Interface activity three

Source: the authors.

As can be seen, the exercises presented in activities one, two and three of the game, seek to improve the skills of users with dyscalculia in terms of the association of a number with its quantity and the development of counting and basic mathematical operations.

Videogame assessment

The proposed video game was evaluated by a group of experts in the area of human computer interaction using an inspection method, which is guided by Pinelle's 10 heuristic principles. A usability inspection is the generic name for a set of effective forms or methods for evaluating the user interfaces in order to find usability problems; they are very informal and easy to use. Thus, this method consists of gathering a group of experts who analyze or inspect an application to make a report commenting on different usability aspects based on their experience in the area and a set of previously defined principles, report used in order to make the necessary changes or adjustments to the application, solving the specified problems (Enríquez & Casas, 2014).

In this way, the heuristics considered for the inspection were: H1, consistent response to user actions; H2, customization of game’s multimedia settings, difficulty, and speed; H3, predictable and reasonable behavior of the controlled units; H4, unobstructed views for the user’s current actions; H6, intuitive and personalized inputs; H7, easy to manage controls with an appropriate level of sensitivity and response; H8, information about the state of the game; H9, instructions, training, and help; and H10, easy to interpret visual representations. As for the heuristics that were adequately fulfilled in the video game are H1, H8 and H10, this considering that the game responds consistently and intuitively to the actions of the player (H1), clearly presents the information at different times of the interaction, helping to understand the general purpose and progress of an activity (H8), and finally makes use of visual representations in the different activities, which are easy to understand for a player (H10). On the other hand, according to the evaluation the heuristics that can be improved are H2, H6 and H8, the above considering that the game does not allow the configuration of basic multimedia options for the volume and background music (H2), that it is necessary that the game can be operated alternatively through the use of keyboard commands (H6) and finally, that it does not have an explicit option that allows understanding the objectives and the management of the controls (H9).

Conclusions and future work

In the present work, a video game was proposed as a support to the development of therapies in people with dyscalculia for educational environments, which involves exercises related to numerical associations, basic operations and counting, taken from conventional therapies carried out by professors and experts in this area. Thus, the proposed video game has been designed using a tabbed panel through the components provided by the Java Swing library, which allows the easy integration of a greater number of learning activities associated with dyscalculia. In this sense, the game provides ideas that can be taken into account by designers and developers for the creation of new activities.

In order to facilitate the implementation of the game within an educational institution, this project proposed the use of Raspberry PI boards with their basic peripherals (screen, keyboard and mouse). In this sense, to facilitate the integration of the game with the operating system, it was decided to develop it in the Java programming language, given its portability advantages. According to the opinion of the evaluators, the game review showed that it is simple and intuitive for interaction with the user; however, it is possible to improve certain aspects such as the personalization of multimedia options, facilitate keyboard interaction and improve help options. In this sense, as future work derived from the present investigation, it is intended to perform a validation of the prototype generated in the real environment through the use of conventional usability tests, and improve it including a greater number of learning activities.

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