Skip to main content

Exploring Children’s Use of a Remotely Controlled Surfacebot Character for Storytelling

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Intelligent Technologies for Interactive Entertainment (INTETAIN 2017)

Abstract

This paper explores the use of a remotely controlled character to be used by children in storytelling activities. The character is implemented in a moveable tablet or surfacebot, which supports the development of inexpensive expressive agents capable of moving around in real space, applicable in diverse play contexts. We carried out an exploratory study of children’s interaction with an intermediate prototype. Based on the children’s comments and our observations during the tests, we discuss which interaction aspects should be taken into consideration and which technical features should be further developed in a surfacebot-based storytelling system.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 44.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 60.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  1. Alofs, T., Theune, M., Swartjes, I.: A tabletop interactive storytelling system: designing for social interaction. Int. J. Arts Technol. 8(3), 188–211 (2015)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Alves, A., Lopes, R., Matos, P., Velho, L., Silva, D.: Reactoon: storytelling in a tangible environment. In: 3rd IEEE International Conference on Digital Game and Intelligent Toy Enhanced Learning, pp. 161–165 (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Aylett, R., Louchart, S., Dias, J., Paiva, A., Vala, M.: FearNot! - an experiment in emergent narrative. In: Intelligent Virtual Agents, pp. 305–316 (2005)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Cao, X., Lindley, S., Helmes, J., Sellen, A.: Telling the whole story: anticipation, inspiration and reputation in a field deployment of TellTable. In: ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, pp. 251–260 (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Hall, T.: Digital renaissance: the creative potential of narrative technology in education. Creat. Educ. 3(1), 96–100 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Holz, T., Dragone, M., O’Hare, G.: Where robots and virtual agents meet: a survey of social interaction. Int. J. Soc. Robot. 1(1), 83–93 (2009)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Fridin, M.: Storytelling by a kindergarten social assistive robot: a tool for constructive learning in preschool education. Comput. Educ. 70, 53–64 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Garzotto, F.: Interactive storytelling for children: a survey. Int. J. Arts Technol. 7(1), 5–16 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Klaassen, R., Hendrix, J., Reidsma, D., op den Akker, R., van Dijk, B., op den Akker, H.: Elckerlyc goes mobile - enabling natural interaction in mobile user interfaces. Int. J. Adv. Telecommun. 6(1&2), 45–56 (2013)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Kory, J., Breazeal, C.: Storytelling with robots: learning companions for preschool children’s language development. In: 23rd IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, pp. 643–648 (2014)

    Google Scholar 

  11. Leite, I., McCoy, M., Lohani, M., Ullman, D., Salomons, N., Stokes, C., Rivers, S., Scassellati, B.: Emotional storytelling in the classroom: individual versus group interaction between children and robots. In: 10th Annual ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, pp. 75–82. ACM, New York (2015). https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2696481

  12. Leversund, A.H., Krzywinski, A., Chen, W.: Children’s collaborative storytelling on a tangible multitouch tabletop. In: Streitz, N., Markopoulos, P. (eds.) DAPI 2014. LNCS, vol. 8530, pp. 142–153. Springer, Cham (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-07788-8_14

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  13. Lu, F., Tian, F., Jiang, Y., Cao, X., Luo, W., Li, G., Zhang, X., Dai, G., Wang, H.: ShadowStory: creative and collaborative digital storytelling inspired by cultural heritage. In: SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2011). ACM, New York, pp. 1919–1928 (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Reidsma, D., van Welbergen, H.: AsapRealizer in practice – a modular and extensible architecture for a BML realizer. Entertain. Comput. 4(3), 157–169 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Ribeiro, P., Iurgel, I., Ferreira, M.: Voodoo: a system that allows children to create animated stories with action figures as interface. In: Si, M., Thue, D., André, E., Lester, J.C., Tanenbaum, J., Zammitto, V. (eds.) ICIDS 2011. LNCS, vol. 7069, pp. 354–357. Springer, Heidelberg (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-25289-1_47

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  16. Riedl, M.O., Young, R.M.: Narrative planning: balancing plot and character. J. Artif. Intell. Res. 39, 217–267 (2010)

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  17. Ryokai, K., Lee, M.J., Breitbart, J.M.: Children’s storytelling and programming with robotic characters. In: 7th ACM Conference on Creativity and Cognition, pp. 19–28. ACM, New York (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Shapiro, L.R., Hudson, J.A.: Tell me a make-believe story: coherence and cohesion in young children’s picture-elicited narratives. Dev. Psychol. 27(6), 960–974 (1991)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Sugimoto, M.A.: Mobile mixed-reality environment for children’s storytelling using a handheld projector and a robot. IEEE Trans. Learn. Technol. 4(3), 249–260 (2011)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Sylla, C., Coutinho, C., Branco, P., Müller, W.: Investigating the use of digital manipulatives for storytelling in pre-school. Int. J. Child-Comput. Interact. 6(Dec 2015), 39–48 (2015)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Sylla, C., Coutinho, C., Branco, P.: A digital manipulative for embodied “stage-narrative” creation. Entertain. Comput. 5, 495–507 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Trabasso, T., Secco, T., van den Broek, P.: Causal cohesion and story coherence. In: Mandl, H., Stein, N.L., Trabasso, T. (eds.) Learning and Comprehension of Text, pp. 223–225. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale (1982)

    Google Scholar 

  23. Wang, G., Tao, Y., Liu, E., Wang, Y., Yao, C., Ying, F.: Constructive play: designing for role play stories with interactive play objects. In: 9th International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction, pp. 575–580. ACM, New York (2015)

    Google Scholar 

  24. Westlund, J.K., Breazeal, C.: The interplay of robot language level with children’s language learning during storytelling. In: 10th Annual ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction Extended Abstracts, pp. 65–66. ACM, New York (2015)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

Our thanks to the schools, teachers and children participating in the activities. Special thanks to Daniel Davison for arranging the school day trips. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 701991.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alejandro Catala .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 ICST Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering

About this paper

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this paper

Catala, A., Theune, M., Reidsma, D., ter Stal, S., Heylen, D. (2018). Exploring Children’s Use of a Remotely Controlled Surfacebot Character for Storytelling. In: Chisik, Y., Holopainen, J., Khaled, R., Luis Silva, J., Alexandra Silva, P. (eds) Intelligent Technologies for Interactive Entertainment. INTETAIN 2017. Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering, vol 215. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73062-2_9

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73062-2_9

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-73061-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-73062-2

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics