Toddlepuff Game
Ilan Schifter, a recent graduate of NYU's ITP, came up with a inflatable game-space for toddlers called ToddlePuff. Here's how Ilan describes it:
Here's a link to a video of two young sisters playing ToddlePuff. Even without the inflatable environment, kids may enjoy the "Flat for Rent" story, available, ToddlePuff.com.
ToddlePuff is an inflated interface that incorporates 16 proximity sensors and acts as a game controller for toddlers. It surrounds the child and encourages full body motion. It blocks the toddler's eye sight to create an immersive experience and is wider than a toddler's arm span to encourage movement. An animated children's story is displayed on a screen and told through the speakers. Images of characters from the story are placed on different locations inside the interface. When a character blinks on the screen, the child needs to find the matching image on the surrounding inflated walls and touch it to resume the story. The interaction inside ToddlePuff develops orientation, coordination and speed.
Here's a link to a video of two young sisters playing ToddlePuff. Even without the inflatable environment, kids may enjoy the "Flat for Rent" story, available, ToddlePuff.com.
the latest
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Paging Dr. Skinner...
where's the tray with corn to peck at?
straight out of Fahrenheit 451.
My question about this would be how "pick up and go" is this concept? Obviously, there's set up in any electronic experience for kids, but this seems pretty elaborate and asks the kids to conform to a pretty small ruleset experience. The younger girl at one point even asks "Can I touch that one?" 20 seconds in and she wants to explore other options, little scientist in the making there.
I believe this idea derives from scenes in The Director's Cut of "Peeping Tom."
I've never used this in a post before but 'OMFG'.
I have two little kids that I hope never see this kind of Pavlovian thing. Children are meant to explore the world. The big problem, in my mind, is that no-one can make money off of a rock, a stick, some dirt and space to play.
This is not a joke? Christ. This has to be a joke. Let's remove children from any coordination of sensory input with reality. Yeah, that's wise for the species. It's all TV, kids, custom made for your blind, worm-like entertainment. Don't engage with reality, it's boring! And scary! The screen will teach you all the skills you need, like how to move your first two fingers and respond to the moving pictures in the box.
I've done work with kids with various disabilities, and I thought for a brief second that this monstrosity might provide some relief for kids who can't get outside or participate in the regular kid activites easily. But that's not the answer - it's still better on every level to get kids up, moving, and engaged.
What is this supposed to be good for? Cause I don't see the purpose.
What you, Amish? I see two kids having a lot of fun playing a game.
I might be better if the subject was immersed in a warm liquid goo to facilitate ______________.
The adult inflatafriend version of this will be available soon.
If its already out there, I don't want to know.
I see two kids having a lot of fun playing a game.
I saw a 2 y/o yesterday that was having a lot of fun carrying around a shoe box.
Much safer and more stimulating than a playground!
A friend of mine was joking that one day they will invent some kind of robot to look after children. My girlfriend replied "They already did, its called television"
@12
and that's a good thing how?
#11 So since a shoebox can be fun, this interactive game-thingy is a technological abomination that will destroy our children by treating them like laboratory animals?
@15
nail. head. ;)
@ #8 Scarybug: actually, I think for the 2 year old it was maybe fun to touch, but for the 4 year old it wasn't too much fun, because the animation was toooooo simple and boring. and anyway after the first time they tried it, it would get boring, unless there are loads of characters and stories, to change them each time they want to play. well at least that's what my nieces would need..and they are of the same age.
#15 Yes, frankly.
A complete picture of developmental-age learning involves sensory input of all types, and this type of junk limits, controls, and over-directs. Get to the next level! Stay in the box!
With a shoebox, at least you get stimulated creativity, multi-sensory input not limited to eyes and two fingers and a couple of intermittent ding-dongy sounds.
Critical also to children's learning is knowing that they are creating a bigger picture of What the World Means and their place in it. Plant the seed, up comes the plant, eat the tomato. This crazy machine offers none of that, and in fact actively removes that possibility of building those connections. Press the button. You win or you lose. No consequences. There's a level of meta-learning that is just eliminated.
How about a toy that builds citizens intead of blind, helpless consumers who are good at pushing buttons?
to be more precise (cos I noticed people here like to find the least important mistake in one's comment and I don't think me knowing or thinking this makes any difference): I do not *know* if what I've just written in my previous comment is true or not, but for me it very much seems so...(that thing is not as much fun as we might think. kids are much more used to visual stimuli to be amazed at some simple graphics like those)
however, if we want to teach kids the different animals, but cannot take them to a farm, maybe this is a good way..or for learners of English as a second language?! :)
I heard they got a big order from B3K.
This device seems remarkably similar to the Sega Activator, a Genesis peripheral from the 90s.
http://www.destructoid.com/sega-activator-the-crappiest-game-peripheral-26148.phtml
I'm sure that Ilan had the best of intentions, but I would never want to trap my son in one of those things.
I think there are some good elements to this. What if the sensors activated various sounds (like different notes) allowing the child to make their own music?
hmmmmmm... wouldn't you just:
(?) read your kids a story
(?) play games with them
if you don't have time for those two simple things and would rather spend your income on such a ridiculous device than i feel sorry for you...
as an early childhood development specialist, i can honestly say after watching that video that those kids appear to be getting no valuable stimulation from this - seriously, a cardboard box and some (washable!) markers is still head and shoulders above this technology...
where is the innovation? "DO THIS NOW! NOW DO THIS!" where is the spontaneity and intellectual stimulation? i could see this technology being more useful if it had a user-controlled experience and something less linear than than the story they demo - that said the developers really need to get some input from people who actually understand what young minds and bodies require...
step outside the box! (yeah, i had to say it)
'Game-Space for Toddlers': Kit includes 'Ball', 'Stick', 'Large Cardboard Box' and, crucially, 'Involved and Interested Parent'. Other add-ons include 'Walk in the Park' and 'Harass the cat till he sulks under the wardrobe' (last add-on is homebrewed code, not intended to be run on the system, however amusing it may be).
Just take away the game and you've got an inflatable child-cage.
Sounds good to me.
(I'm the designer of ToddlePuff)
If we like it or not, it becomes more and more popular for toddlers to play computer games. This includes hours of seating down in front of a keyboard and mouse while gazing at the screen. The interfaces that do offer physical movement still require the child to focus on the screen at all times because that's where the interaction happens. My attempt with ToddlePuff is to move the interaction out of the screen and back into the space that surrounds the child (living room). ToddlePuff is tangible so that toddlers would touch it (toddlers explore using touch) and is inflatable to be act as a cushioned environment that can support toddlers tendency to overshoot. The interface is not about keeping toddlers at home. It provides a tangible and spatial alternative to the passive gazing at the screen interfaces popular today. ToddlePuff lets toddlers move and interact with the space around them. That's what they do naturally.
Some comments:
- The loud music sound in the background in the video is from a very cool project in the same room but has nothing to do with ToddlePuff.
- The gaps between tubes in the interface may make it look like a cage (oops) but are actually there to enable children to enter and exit the interface easily and independently.
- 2 year old kids loved the interaction but ignored the story.
- 4 year old kids loved the story but where a bit bored with the interaction.
- 3 year old kids enjoyed both the story and interaction.
So how would you accommodate the very valid criticisms of what this type of "activity" does (or fails to do) for early childhood development? Based on your response, (your comments about what children ignored or were bored by), you don't come across as well versed in childhood development. Seems like there's an opportunity here for you.
It's an intellectual cop-out and the cheapest kind of pandering to say "Kids like it, it's popular, hey, I'm just responding to the market." We all like too much vodka too, but that doesn't make it healthy.
You could start minimally with:
-Get the movement out of a damn cage.
-Make the interaction creative, not fill in the blank and predictable.
- Involve parents.
-Involve all sorts of sensory/motor combinations, not just fingers and eyes. And don't just shoot for fast hand/eye coordination: that is nothing more than learning to click the button better.
-Get real. Connect kids with the world around them and encourage them out of the living room and out of the house.
@7 @18 & @29 (or magicbean in short), thanks for your comments.
ToddlePuff is an interface for computer games and provides many opportunities for spatial interactions. Toddlers didn't feel trapped inside it but I can imagine how it could look intimidating in the technical sketch and the narrow shot video. This was a prototype but imagine ToddlePuff in a shape of a pirate ship, train, castle, space ship etc. The next inflatable will not remind anyone of a cage, I promise. In any case, it is not a substitute for any outdoor activity, just offers a better replacement for the 2D keyboard and mouse. I hope this is clear now.
"Flat for Rent" is an example of a game that develops symbolic thinking, coordination and spatial orientations in addition to colors, animals, sounds and social values. I'm developing more games and your suggestions are valid. Creativity is extremely important and an example could be a Kitchen game where children learn to "cook" according to recipes and can invent their own cakes, breads and soups that eventually appear on the screen. I'll post more about that game after user testing.
ILANS - it looks interesting as a concept; I see (from your last comment) the possibilities. Maybe gating the enclosure, and papering it with a flexible display to embed the items they need to touch. Could make for an interesting interactive environment.
Good job!
A sight on our way to become still, unmoving beings. The world will flicker around us and provide neuronal interaction, and new sights. The content control becomes extremely important. Then again, the reality will always be an approximation.
Just don't try to climb in if you're an adult. Lions'll eat you.
I don't see the harm in this, although I think it's kind of sad. But unless kids are forced to hang out in it for hours, they will find something else to do.
I have two daughters, three and five. As I type this, they have unfettered access to a computer and two televisions. Instead, they are playing some sort of complicated game with their stuffed animals and two laundry baskets. When they get bored of that, they will probably jump on the beds and dump all their crayons on the floor and cut some paper into little bits and make a huge mess.
Sometimes they glue themselves to the TV or the computer. I don't restrict it and am pretty happy at their proficiency with the computer. But more often than not, they will be thrilled with a cardboard tissue box and a pair of scissors or a handful of pipe cleaners.
Gilbert Wham @25 and, crucially, 'Involved and Interested Parent'.
Yes! So many products and "experts" focus on learning and stimulation, but one of the most important thing toddlers learn is social interaction, which technology cannot (and probably will never be able to) teach. Parents feel like they have to cram their kids' heads full of knowledge and skills literally from birth, but the most important things kids learn in early childhood is how to be a human being.
this stuff looks more like a gizmo cage to me....
this thing reminds me of the beginning of conan the barbarian. After killing his entire family and setting his village ablaze, conan is raised by the serpent kings minions, who, in the interest of making sure conan grows up big and strong; force conan to turn a large heavy cog untill his early 30's. I for one dont want the children of tomorrow bonking camels heads like they're going out of style.
Only on boingboing could i make a post like this and expect people to know what I'm talking about.
Hail Mighty Crom,
Tyler.