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Augmented Reality for Audio: A Workshop

A Spring 2023 CS 196 / EDU T217 Final Project by Jasmyne Roberts

What (is this)?

This final project is intended to be an interdisciplinary workshop guide that uses location-based audio stories to encourage students to think critically about the relationships between technology, the self, and society. With this guide and facilitator guidance, workshop participants will create and share their own mini audio narratives and engage in discussion about them. Over the course of the workshop, participants will be encouraged to think about the following questions, categorized by topic.

Technology

• How can I use pattern matching to make sense of new code in an unfamiliar programming language? How can I apply my current technical knowledge to new and unfamiliar problems?
• How can technology connect people together in the real world?
• What does it mean to tell or consume a story?

Self

• How do I feel about the physical spaces around me?
• How can I clearly articulate my thoughts, feelings, and experiences for other people to hear?
• What can I gain from being more aware of everyday spaces?

Society

• What types of backgrounds and stories surround me?
• What makes me similar to and different from people around me?
• Why might I have an experience, reaction, or memory about a physical location that differs from others around me?

Who (is it for)?

This workshop is targeted at K-12 students who are comfortable coding in at least one programming language. The workshop guide itself is built for afterschool program leaders and teachers to use. While the guide is detailed to introduce the facilitator to the project and process, it is meant to be a stepping-off point—there isn’t one set way to teach from this guide, and different facilitators might focus their students on different elements of the project, depending on the participants (younger or beginner programmers), course goals (art versus computer science class), or anticipated consistency in attendance over the various days of the workshop.

Why (does this exist)?

This semester, I was most intrigued by the papers and case studies that incorporated programming with the real world. These came in two forms: tactile programming efforts like KIBO and OctoStudio; and culturally relevant educational practices, like CRCS and Digital Youth Divas, that used computer science to connect students with their various backgrounds, extracurricular interests, and their busy minds and bodies. Similarly, I wanted to design an opportunity for young learners to use computer science as a tool to explore outside of the classroom and voice their own thoughts.

In my own K-12 education, technology classes always took place indoors in the computer lab. Whereas my natural science classes took me on field trips and outdoor excursions to dig in the dirt, computer science kept me indoors and sedentary. Computer science also had me working on solving problems that I couldn’t connect to my own life, and didn’t give me the guidance necessary to feel confident about injecting my own interests into the projects I created. Therefore, this project also comes from my desire to combine my own interests in computer science, storytelling, and audio.

What (do you have so far)?

Currently, I have a few things that I’d like to highlight about my project:

1. A outlined guide for the three segments of the workshop, complete with how to create and interact with the audio stories
2. Three example audio experiences (Kamryn’s, Matthew’s, Louis’)
3. The Twine files that created them (Kamryn’s, Matthew’s, Louis’)
4. A Twine template for students and instructors to build their own stories.

Who (do you have to thank)?

Karen Brennan and Brian Yu, of course! And a huge thank you to my classmates in CS 196 / EDU T217: Designing K-12 CS Experiences.