STEM Project Proposal

Project Proposal:

• Our new proposed project is the creation of video games intended for autistic children. The idea is to study the common challenges that autistic children face and create games to help them learn how to deal with these problems. Another thought on this project is to possibly expand the project to other mental disorders common in children, depending on how long work on games for autistic children takes.Once we complete at least one game, we plan to create a website using awardspace.com which will allow us to post these games. Additionally, our games will function both on a computer as well as on a mobile touchscreen device.

Plan:

Week of:

12/20 - 12/26: Conduct research on autism in children, as well as a state of the art research. Create several ideas for games.

12/27 1/2: Assign game to each team member. Both of us will draft plans for our games, like a checklist. We will subsequently begin work on the games.

Beyond this, a schedule is hard to foresee, as we don’t yet have an idea of how complex our games may end up being. In the beginning of week 12/27 - 1/2 we will add make our schedule more specific since we’ll know what our games will be.

We’ve begun research on Autism and the state of the art already, here is what we’ve found:

Characteristics of Autism include difficulties with social interaction, communication, as well as behavioural issues. More specifically:

Social Interaction:

• limited use and understanding of nonverbal communication such as eye gaze, facial expression and gesture
• difficulties forming and sustaining friendships
• lack of seeking to share enjoyment, interests and activities with other people
• difficulties with social and emotional responsiveness

Communication:

• delayed language development
• difficulties initiating and sustaining conversations
• stereotyped and repetitive use of language such as repeating phrases from television

Behavioural:

• unusually intense or focused interests
• stereotyped and repetitive body movements such as hand flapping and spinning
• repetitive use of objects such as repeatedly switching lights on and off or lining up toys
• insistence on sticking to routines such  travelling the same route home each day and doing things in exactly the same order every time
• unusual sensory interests such as sniffing objects or staring intently at moving objects
• sensory sensitivities including avoidance of everyday sounds and textures such as hair dryers, vacuum cleaners and sand
• intellectual impairment or learning difficulties

As part of our state of the art research we came across this website:

http://www.autismgames.com.au/

This site has five games available, all intended to help autistic children develop independent living skills under the categories: “coping with change”, “matching emotions”, “finding a route”, and “making eye contact”, which the site states are all common challenges faced by autistic children.