YOO KYOUNG NOH

Assignment - Devise an interactive electronic toy, tool or game where the user/player controls, creates or reacts to sound or music.

Concept - I proposed a sound toy that helps young children(3-6yr) sleep well at night. Through the research about children, I found out that a lot of children are afraid of sleeping alone in the dark room or hate to go to bed, because they do not want to give up the fun of daytime exercise. So, I came up with the concept that children can play with it while they are sleeping. I made two different versions of flash prototype for the sound toy. One version is as their parents are reading a bedtime story or singing a lullaby to their child, the stars are interactive by the sound and the more stars come up in the sky. If they don't make any sound, stars will gradually disappear. And if the parent make the loudest sound, a flying spaceship appears on the screen. Another version is that when child is in the room alone, he/she needs to be really quiet, otherwise the stars will disappear.

Paulo, 3years old

Version 1

User testing for version 1

Version 2

User tesing for version 2

Result

- While his mom was singing a lullaby, he showed interest in the microphone and couldn't focus on the screen on the ceiling. He really thought the microphone attached with a star shaped paper as a real sound toy.

- When he found out that he could make the spaceship appears on the sky by making a sound, he enjoyed and excited the moment.

- The sound and light from the projector bothered him to get sleep well.

- After his dad left his room, the kid tried to keeping being quiet to see more stars. During the second test, there was a really interesting moment. He dropped the microphone on the floor. After he found it, and he checked up the ceiling if the starts had disappeared.

Future direction

Since the kid were attractive by the microphone and could not focus on the screen on the ceiling, the microphone should be embed in the object such as a bed in the room. Also, flexible LEDs can be used for the screen on the ceiling instead of using a projector. When the graphics appear on the screen, he seemed to be more interested in the sound toy. Also, I thought that if the visuals on the screen is related to the content of the bedtime story, it would help the user engage to use the sound toy and bring more emotional experience and effect. So, I would like to develop this sound toy, as their parent read a bedtime story, the characters of the bedtime story show up like constellation shape on the ceiling. When their parent leave the kid's room, the mode of the sound toy will be changed to make the kid quiet. The stars will stay there as long as they keep being quiet, otherwise, the stars will disappear.