Abstract The notion of Calm Technology, which can move between our focal and peripheral attention, is a potentially valuable but underexplored concept in relation to smart connected toys. In this paper, we explored two interconnected research questions: (a) How can scaffolding support children in understanding Calm and designing for Calm connected toys? (b) To what extent can children contribute towards the design of novel connected toys that apply Calm Technology Principles? Building on UX practice and research we developed a participatory approach to working with children we call Design School, which gave children knowledge and experience of a design process. Additionally, we created design cards to use within the Design School, which scaffolded the inclusion of Calm technology design principles within children’s designs. The Design School workshops ran over four days in a U.K. school with 30 children aged 10–11 years, design outputs were analyzed to answer the research questions. From our experiences and analysis, we make four contributions: (a) the success of design cards as a tool to scaffold children in operationalizing unfamiliar design principles, (b) an understanding of how different design activities afforded expression of Calm in design ideas, and (c) the Design School workshop format, which proved effective in enabling children to engage in design activities.

Abstract This study highlights a value-led investigation into children’s (aged 9–18) views on decolonising museum experiences. The paper presents the challenges and opportunities associated with using a low-fidelity Augmented Reality authoring tool (User Experience Values Framing) to personalise museum experiences. The tool captures children’s values by employing a Value Sensitive Design approach, in addressing issues of representation, power imbalances, and cultural responsiveness in museum technologies. Through four empirical studies, the research examines the motivations behind visiting museums, value preferences, and the emergence of values amongst children. It sheds light on the effectiveness of involving children in the design process of an Augmented Reality authoring tool, highlighting their perspectives on decolonisation narratives and the desire for personalised and inclusive museum experiences. The studies highlight the importance of capturing and integrating values related to decolonisation into museum exhibition design, emphasising the needs and preferences of young audiences. Despite limitations, the insights gained offer valuable guidance for museums seeking to create more inclusive and equitable cultural exhibitions.

In a ten-week project with nine school classes across the North West of England we explored ocean health with IT-enabled solutions. We describe the activities carried out under headings of participation, learning, and design. Participation activities, which included recruitment, focused on setting the parameters for children’s inclusion and ensuring they understood how data might be used, and that handing in artefacts to the research team was their choice. Learning happened in an environment of contextual relevance that enabled children to develop data literacy whilst we could explore relevant research questions. Design was a journey from individual to whole-class design, while developing engineering thinking and social cohesion. We reflect on the journey showing that children learned from the activities and acquired a new enthusiasm for their local coastline. We reflect on how our inclusive approach can broaden HCI research to wider communities of children and encourage others to apply our model.

This paper introduces a novel approach in the Child-Computer Interaction (CCI) field that examines how children’s feedback on experimental stimuli can enhance research design, using emotion research as a case study. Our study utilizes interactive vignettes where children act as ’emotion detectives’, providing insights into their emotional articulation, followed by elicited feedback on the stimuli and research process. This method refines emotional vocabulary elicitation techniques and empowers children by incorporating their perspectives into the experimental design. The core of this research lies in establishing a participatory framework for involving children as evaluators, thereby proposing changes within the realm of experimental methodologies. We hope that this could serve as a tool to researchers studying children using an experimental setup.

Utilising a multidisciplinary and user-centred product and service design approach, 'NewsThings' explores the potential for domestic and professional internet of things (IoT) objects to convey journalism, media and information. In placing news audiences and industry at the centre of the prototyping process, the project's web connected objects explore how user requirements may be best met in a perceived post-digital environment. Following a research-through-design methodology and utilising a range of tools - such as workshops, cultural probes, market research and long-term prototype deployment with public and industry, NewsThings aims to generate design insights and prototypes that could position the news media as active participants in the development of IoT products, processes and interactions. This work-in-progress paper outlines the project's approach, methods, initial findings - up to and including the pre-deployment phase - and focuses on novel insights around user-engagement with news, and the multidisciplinary team's responses to them.

This work in progress details the conception of a new inter-disciplinary design intended to benefit the physical activity of running, by combining the sonification of real time personal health statistics with information regarding the surrounding environment. By applying datasets sourced from wearable technologies, a model was designed that generated new original musical materials from detailed figures pertaining to exertion. The resulting music presents an opportunity to iterate new knowledge gained from insights with participants, in order to create a real time mobile application - Pulse - that sonifies both a user's movements through place and the spaces within.

'Children should learn to code', is a simple message that in recent years, has dominated the scene around the development of the computing and technology curriculum. A range of government, public, and privately funded initiatives have highlighted the value of introducing children to coding and computer science. Its role is the broader agenda of encouraging better engagement with Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics (STEAM). As a result of this increased focus, a number of products blending hardware, software, creative thinking and play have emerged onto the market. This paper introduces a co-design process of transforming a playful learning technology product, 'littleBits', into an online digital onboarding experience, to assist creative minds in understanding the technology.

This paper challenges the sustainable HCI community to move away from a focus on demand and instead address climate change as a supply problem. We identify a new route to impact, namely addressing the psychological barriers that interfere with political mobilization toward limiting the use of fossil fuels. Five barriers are explored as a means of re-focusing research objectives for the community.

The majority of mobile devices nowadays harness location and orientation-sensing capabilities, permitting for sensor based Mixed Reality (MR) gaming experiences such as Augmented Reality (AR) games. Nonetheless, only few entertainment implementations of sensor based AR systems emerged, predominantly due to low precision of sensory information causing crude and jerky augmentation, significantly impacting meaningful augmentation that inevitably affects gameplay experience. In this paper, we present a novel pervasive mobile AR Location Based Game (LBG) named Time-wARpXplorer (TARX) where a seamless design approach is used in order to address the quality of augmentation. TARX comprises of a mobile client and an online authoring tool, created to encourage visitors and locals to explore the city of Lancaster by travelling back in time and space to discover their immediate and distant surroundings. Within the game, time travel is linked to present day through the implementation of Foursquare's checkin platform to further raise awareness of historic sites. This paper focuses on the design considerations implemented through an iterative design process and prototyping of the mobile client, of which a novel interface emerged.

Despite the ever expanding forms of digital entertainment, there are still Television (TV, telly) shows and events that create an audience desire to be part of a mass shared experience. In the past direct inter-audience interaction of such events has been restricted to either a shared location at the time of broadcast or later discussions amongst friends and colleagues often described as `water cooler moments'. With the advent of online social networks that facilitate status updates these moments can be instantly shared in real-time, creating a second screen for direct interaction with TV. In this paper we investigate the role of social media as the facilitator of second screen for TV, through the analysis of tweets for weekend primetime UK TV show the X-Factor. The results highlight the rich source of information that can be extracted in real-time and its enormous potential for broadcasters and producers both in terms of reinvigorating live TV viewing and creating new forms of audience interaction.