Playware's Siddharth Jain talks at SADC Part 2

Playware's Siddharth Jain talks at SADC Part 1

Teachers make 3D Games

Teachers make 3D Games

Thanks to some exciting new technology out of Singapore we should be seeing more games in classrooms in the near future.

A recently concluded month long national interschool 3D games for learning competition, for teachers, was organized by Playware Studio and was co-sponsored by Singtel and Microsoft Singapore.

The novel contest required teachers to design and create 3D Games for learning using the 3D Hive rapid game development platform. Participants attended an intensive 3 hour workshop prior to the competition to learn how to use the platform.

Ms Faith Goh from River Valley High School won the grand prize in the inaugural national interschool 3D games for learning design competition. Ms Goh also won the special prize for the best 3D Game for learning (languages category).

The first and second runners up prizes went to Mr. Liu Peng from Canberra primary School and Mr. Zulkifli Mansor from Gongshang Primary School respectively. Other prize winning entries were from teams from Madrasah Al-Arabiah Al-Islamiah, Greenridge Primary School, Tampines Secondary School and Anglican High School.  

Teacher and a Showman

Can Teachers make successful games? Are talented teachers also natural born game designers? Read on to find out how a small team of dedicated developers is challenging conventions and turning the multi-billion dollar serious games industry on its head.

Game development is a huge business with audience counts in millions, huge budgets and large specialized teams. From the Fifa world cup to Angry Birds to Plants and Zombies Game designers are free to work with topics that excite and intrigue their audiences.

Teachers on the other hand usually work with 15 to 30 students on a subject, alone, through a year and have to prepare their own material within the narrow confines of the syllabus prescribed. There is usually no budget to speak of and a lot of performance pressure.

Even though both Game designers and Teachers alike have to go through years of training in their respective fields and require loads of passion, talent and dedication the two professions seem to have little else in common.

Playware Studios a small Singapore based company asserts otherwise.

Learning in Fun-filled Virtual Dimensions

from Schoolbag.sg 


Tuesday, May 3, 2011


It was a bright morning at Canberra Primary School and a class of Primary 5 pupils were standing in line outside the school's 4Di Lab. Judging from their faces, some were looking forward to savouring the air-conditioned environment but were they in for a surprise!


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A Quick trip to the Shanghai Expo

a snippet of a student's journey in 4Di

Learning world's in 3D Hive

Rain forest @ CPS

4Di: Learning with a difference!

The world's largest multi-touch interactive display surface, 4Di makes learning fun, engaging, self-paced and experiential. High-definition, 3D interactive media is projected onto wall-sized touchscreen displays, immersing students in virtual worlds unlike any they have ever seen. 

Students touch, interact, and learn while exploring the virtual environment, gleaning information from various types of embedded media. Students can explore the environments as themselves, or take control of avatars through personal learning devices, allowing the learning journey to transcends the classroom. With the 4Di, the possibilities are endless!

The 4Di Experience

Matt's Diary

Today at school we went on great adventures in our learning lab!

During our Science lesson we went on a field trip to a rainforest in  Borneo.  I was very interested to learn more about the different types of animals, but my friend Siti wanted to learn all about the plants!  We took a lot of notes about what we each learned so we could share  later.

Our trip was even more special because we got to touch the animals or plants. When we touched them, we learned more about them. I got to hear the call of birds and a video about monkey behaviour. It even  rained-- and it got so cold in the lab!

Later during our History lesson we went back in time to WWII  Singapore. I got to control a Chinese merchant using my Personal Learning Device!  My classmate Shan who was absent also came with us using his computer  at home. Together we collected crates and solved a mystery. It was so awesome. I learned a lot about how people lived back then.

Of course, we didn't really go to all those places. We were using the 4Di system in our learning lab. It's an amazing way to travel to worlds we otherwise can't go to!

Shanghai Expo @ CPS

Bringing the world into the classroom

by Tan Weizhen


Without leaving the classroom, students at FutureSchool Canberra Primary can visit the rainforest, the Shanghai World Expo or a historical period in Singapore.

All this thanks to a virtual reality lab unveiled yesterday - believed to be the first of its kind in schools here - which is equipped with 14 touch screens and 40 speakers, with adjustable temperature, visual and sound efforts to provide students with a multi-sensory experience in a classroom setting....


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The Next Generation Train has arrived

by Kenneth James

Picture a series of walls that make up a screen displaying a scene from olden days Singapore. In the scene a junk rocks gently on the Singapore river. People are going about their business on the cobbled street by the river...

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Speech by Mr S Iswaran, Senior Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry & Ministry of Education at MOE ExCEL Fest 2011

extract:

"Today, pupils in Canberra Primary enjoy going on trips back to Singapore in the 1950’s, then on a trip to the Shanghai Expo and even a journey deep into a tropical rainforest, all made possible by 4Di, a virtual immersive learning environment built by the school and industry."

Read the full speech here

“未来学校”计划下 康培小学设四维虚拟教室

康培小学的四维虚拟互动学习室设有14台巨型触屏，还有40个扬声器。一些教师设计了热带雨林的互动场景，学生不仅能看到罕见的动植物，还能听见大自然的声音。一群师生也以上海世博会为灵感制作了学习活动，全校学生都可“游览”上海世博。...


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Schools still not using technology effectively

by Tan Weizhen


SINGAPORE - Three years after the FutureSchools opened their doors and opened a path for other schools to adopt advanced technologies in educating pupils, the trickle-down effect is just beginning.

The test-bed environment at the six FutureSchools - Ngee Ann Secondary and Nan Chiau Primary will soon make it eight - has so far not led to many schools using technology to introduce new and possibly more effective ways of teaching, observers tell MediaCorp....


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Hi-tech Lab makes lesson come alive

by Lei Jiahui

PUPILS of Canberra Primary School can journey into Singapore's past or stride into a lush, tropical rain forest- all without leaving the comfort of your classroom.

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Amazon experience for primary pupils

By Amelia Tan



ONE day, the pupils of Canberra Primary may get to experience the smells of the Amazon rainforest - right in school.
But for now, they have access to a room which has walls lined with large LCD touchscreens and speakers that replicate the look and sound of the rainforest.
When they touch icons on the screens, explanations of the characteristics of living things pop up in the form of text, pictures and videos....

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A live lesson@4Di