Mansel Primary school in the northeast of Sheffield are facing “challenging circumstances” according to officials. The area is characterized by social and economic disadvantages. The students at the school often have learning difficulties. however at this school they are hoping to prove that technology can really help with education.

The “Imaginary Worlds” project was designed to see if a different style of learning would work at the Primary school. The students used a Sony PSP with a camera attached and special software. The software includes a game such as Invizimals, which lets them roam around the school and plot their own imagery journey, then title different areas and place items in these locations which would help them through their journeys.

Semacodes, the small pictures which are used for these sorts of programs to quickly capture a web site address, were located all over the school so that students could associate with images found on the internet, which would appear via the PSP.

After the students had planned out their quests they recorded the audio of their journeys, what they saw and what they heard and did. After the quests were finished they reported their experiences to the class.The teachers report that the projects were a big success, the work the students did was a higher standard than normal, and the bad behavior was lower than normal.

Imaginary World’s has proven that technology can help students in the school environment, maybe this new project will be available for other schools in the near future.

Source