Drones for all: Creating an Authentic Programming Experience for Students with Visual Impairments
Authors: 
Yize Wei, Maëlle Dubucq, Malsha de Zoysa, Christophe Jouffrais, 
Suranga Nanayakkara, 
Wei Tsang OoiAuthors Info & Claims
Yize Wei, Maëlle Dubucq, Malsha de Zoysa, Christophe Jouffrais, Suranga Nanayakkara, Wei Tsang OoiAuthors Info & ClaimsArticle No.: 115, Pages 1 - 7
Abstract
Programming has become a highly sought-after skill in STEM-related studies and careers, but it has only reached a fraction of students with visual impairments. Therefore, there is a need to explore new methods for teaching and learning. This study aims to understand the potential of using drones to create an authentic learning environment to help students with visual impairments learn programming. Based on a month-long engagement with five students with visual impairments, we present insights on using drones to support programming education for students with visual impairments.
References
[1]
Reginald J Alston and Joseph L Hampton. 2000. Science and engineering as viable career choices for students with disabilities: A survey of parents and teachers. Rehabilitation Counseling Bulletin 43, 3 (2000), 158–164.
[2]
Aivar Annamaa. 2015. Introducing Thonny, a Python IDE for learning programming. In Proceedings of the 15th koli calling conference on computing education research. 117–121.
[3]
Mauro Avila Soto, Markus Funk, Matthias Hoppe, Robin Boldt, Katrin Wolf, and Niels Henze. 2017. Dronenavigator: Using leashed and free-floating quadcopters to navigate visually impaired travelers. In Proceedings of the 19th international acm sigaccess conference on computers and accessibility. 300–304.
[4]
Ou Bai, Hongwei Chu, 2021. Drones in education: A critical review. Turkish Journal of Computer and Mathematics Education (TURCOMAT) 12, 11 (2021), 1722–1727.
[5]
Catherine M Baker. 2017. Increasing access to computer science for blind students. ACM SIGACCESS Accessibility and Computing117 (2017), 19–22.
[6]
Catherine M Baker, Cynthia L Bennett, and Richard E Ladner. 2019. Educational experiences of blind programmers. In Proceedings of the 50th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education. 759–765.
[7]
Anuparp Boonsongsrikul and Jirapon Eamsaard. 2023. Real-Time Human Motion Tracking by Tello EDU Drone. Sensors 23, 2 (2023), 897.
[8]
Nataliya Boyko, Oleg Basystiuk, and Nataliya Shakhovska. 2018. Performance evaluation and comparison of software for face recognition, based on dlib and opencv library. In 2018 IEEE Second International Conference on Data Stream Mining & Processing (DSMP). IEEE, 478–482.
[9]
Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke. 2006. Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative research in psychology 3, 2 (2006), 77–101.
[10]
Wei Fang, Lin Wang, and Peiming Ren. 2019. Tinier-YOLO: A real-time object detection method for constrained environments. IEEE Access 8 (2019), 1935–1944.
[11]
Vinitha Gadiraju, Jérémie Garcia, Shaun Kane, and Anke M. Brock. 2021. “It is fascinating to make these beasts fly”: Understanding Visually Impaired People’s Motivations and Needs for Drone Piloting. In Proceedings of the 23rd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility. 1–12.
[12]
Vicki L Hanson, Anna Cavender, and Shari Trewin. 2015. Writing about accessibility. Interactions 22, 6 (2015), 62–65.
[13]
Jan Herrington and Ron Oliver. 2000. An instructional design framework for authentic learning environments. Educational technology research and development 48, 3 (2000), 23–48.
[14]
Jan Herrington, Thomas C Reeves, and Ron Oliver. 2014. Authentic learning environments. Springer.
[15]
Felix Huppert, Gerold Hoelzl, and Matthias Kranz. 2021. GuideCopter-A precise drone-based haptic guidance interface for blind or visually impaired people. In Proceedings of the 2021 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 1–14.
[16]
Varsha Koushik, Darren Guinness, and Shaun K Kane. 2019. Storyblocks: A tangible programming game to create accessible audio stories. In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 1–12.
[17]
Marilyn M Lombardi and Diana G Oblinger. 2007. Authentic learning for the 21st century: An overview. Educause learning initiative 1, 2007 (2007), 1–12.
[18]
Alaa Maalouf, Yotam Gurfinkel, Barak Diker, Oren Gal, Daniela Rus, and Dan Feldman. 2023. Deep Learning on Home Drone: Searching for the Optimal Architecture. In 2023 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA). IEEE, 8208–8215.
[19]
Patricia McCarthy and Michael Shevlin. 2017. Opportunities and challenges in secondary education for blind/vision-impaired people in the Republic of Ireland. Disability & Society 32, 7 (2017), 1007–1026.
[20]
Lauren R Milne and Richard E Ladner. 2018. Blocks4All: overcoming accessibility barriers to blocks programming for children with visual impairments. In Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 1–10.
[21]
Wendye Dianne Mingo. 2013. The effects of applying authentic learning strategies to develop computational thinking skills in computer literacy students. (2013).
[22]
Cecily Morrison, Nicolas Villar, Anja Thieme, Zahra Ashktorab, Eloise Taysom, Oscar Salandin, Daniel Cletheroe, Greg Saul, Alan F Blackwell, Darren Edge, 2020. Torino: A tangible programming language inclusive of children with visual disabilities. Human–Computer Interaction 35, 3 (2020), 191–239.
[23]
Ana Cristina Pires, Filipa Rocha, Antonio José de Barros Neto, Hugo Simão, Hugo Nicolau, and Tiago Guerreiro. 2020. Exploring accessible programming with educators and visually impaired children. In Proceedings of the Interaction Design and Children Conference. 148–160.
[24]
Shahira Popat and Louise Starkey. 2019. Learning to code or coding to learn? A systematic review. Computers & Education 128 (2019), 365–376. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2018.10.005
[25]
Richard M Ryan. 1982. Control and information in the intrapersonal sphere: An extension of cognitive evaluation theory.Journal of personality and social psychology 43, 3 (1982), 450.
[26]
Richard M Ryan, Valerie Mims, and Richard Koestner. 1983. Relation of reward contingency and interpersonal context to intrinsic motivation: A review and test using cognitive evaluation theory.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 45, 4 (1983), 736.
[27]
Alpay Sabuncuoglu. 2020. Tangible music programming blocks for visually impaired children. In Proceedings of the Fourteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction. 423–429.
[28]
Laura Stegner, Emmanuel Senft, and Bilge Mutlu. 2023. Situated participatory design: A method for in situ design of robotic interaction with older adults. In Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 1–15.
[29]
KVV Subash, M Venkata Srinu, MRV Siddhartha, NC Sri Harsha, and Praneeth Akkala. 2020. Object detection using Ryze Tello drone with help of mask-RCNN. In 2020 2nd International Conference on Innovative Mechanisms for Industry Applications (ICIMIA). IEEE, 484–490.
[30]
Ratna Wardani, Masduki Zakaria, Priyanto Priyanto, Muhammad Irfan Luthfi, Irma Nuur Rochmah, Andy Ferry Rahman, and Muhammad Trio Maulana Putra. 2021. An authentic learning approach to assist the computational thinking in mathematics Learning for elementary school. Elinvo (Electronics, Informatics, and Vocational Education) 6, 2 (2021), 139–148.
[31]
Jeannette M Wing. 2006. Computational thinking. Commun. ACM 49, 3 (2006), 33–35.
[32]
Jeannette M Wing. 2008. Computational thinking and thinking about computing. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences 366, 1881 (2008), 3717–3725.
Index Terms
- Drones for all: Creating an Authentic Programming Experience for Students with Visual Impairments
Recommendations
Addressing Accessibility Barriers in Programming for People with Visual Impairments: A Literature Review
Accessibility issues with programming languages and programming environments pose a major barrier for students with visual impairments to participate in computing related courses as well as threatens the productivity of professional programmers with ...
Accessible Blockly: An Accessible Block-Based Programming Library for People with Visual Impairments
ASSETS '22: Proceedings of the 24th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and AccessibilityThe visual and mouse-centric nature of block-based programming environments generally make them inaccessible and challenging to use by users with visual impairments who rely on assistive technologies to interact with computers. This prevents these users ...
UUnderstanding Novices’ Perceptions of “Authentic” Programming
ICER '23: Proceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research - Volume 2Authentic learning, characterized by engagement with real-world problems and tools, has long been of interest in education due to its impact on student motivation and learning outcomes [2, 7]. In computer science (CS) education, however, students and ...
Comments
Information & Contributors
Information
Published In
October 2024
1475 pages
ISBN:9798400706776
DOI:10.1145/3663548
Copyright © 2024 Owner/Author.
Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.
Sponsors
Publisher
Association for Computing Machinery
New York, NY, United States
Publication History
Published: 27 October 2024
Check for updates
Author Tags
Qualifiers
- Poster
- Research
- Refereed limited
Funding Sources
- Ministry of Education AcRF
Conference
ASSETS '24
Sponsor:
ASSETS '24: The 26th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility
October 27 - 30, 2024
NL, St. John's, Canada
Acceptance Rates
Overall Acceptance Rate 436 of 1,556 submissions, 28%
Upcoming Conference
Contributors
Other Metrics
Bibliometrics & Citations
Bibliometrics
Article Metrics
- 0Total Citations
- 83Total Downloads
- Downloads (Last 12 months)83
- Downloads (Last 6 weeks)28
Reflects downloads up to 27 Feb 2025
Other Metrics
Citations
View Options
Login options
Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.
Sign inFull Access
View options
View or Download as a PDF file.
PDFeReader
View online with eReader.
eReaderHTML Format
View this article in HTML Format.
HTML Format