Oliverblythe's Blog

I went out to my sisters school to have a chat with one of the kindergarden teachers there, and it was one of the best things iv done so far. She gave me HEAPS of useful ideas/ wyas that it could be used, as well as outlining ways that my design could help children develop. She also loved the idea of having different textures etc on the instruments, saying that it would help partially blind children, children with autism, and children asbergers (not sure if thats how you spell it… ). For the partially blind children it would help because it helps them to explore the toy, and with the children with autism and asbergers, they usually don’t like sensory things, so if they can be drawn to the toy by visuals etc, then they will explore the touch etc of the toy as well, even though they don’t like doing it. I think iv explained that pretty badly, but its very exciting to see the different ways that the final design will be able to be used, and to see the design growing and developing.

After talking to her I’m also working a new aspect into the design: there will be cards with music on them that the children can play, which will help to build literacy skills. There would be at least 3 different levels of difficulty/complexity, which also helps the design to be able to ‘grow’ along with the child.