Embodiment awareness, mathematics discourse, and the blind.
Blindness might be described as a biological condition, and thus remedies could be in the realm of biotechnology. However, the convergence of information technology and cognitive science offers great opportunities for understanding and helping blind children as they learn mathematics, the crosscutting discipline most important for all branches of science and engineering. This article outlines our logic and approach for providing blind students with awareness of the embodiment of their teachers to maintain situated communication. First, we shall show that math discourse is inherently spatiotemporal, and that this information is carried by gesticulation in conjunction with speech. Second, we shall explore the capacity of those who are blind for the imagism necessary for mathematics reasoning. Third, we shall advance a set of augmentative devices suggested by our analysis. Finally, we shall outline our ongoing experiments to validate our rationale.
Quek
Francis
F
Center for Human-Computer Interaction, 2202 Kraft Drive, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA. http://www.hci.vt.edu
McNeill
David
D
D001709:Biotechnology / Q000295:instrumentation; D001766:Blindness; D005868:Gestures; D006801:Humans; D033183:Interdisciplinary Communication; D008433:Mathematics; D011578:Psycholinguistics / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods; D013334:Students