Abstract
ORIBAKA — A language to make Origami instruction accessible for people with visual impairments. Activities pursued involved building an understanding of "algorithmic thinking" - a systematic way of breaking down a task into smaller steps and then solving each of those steps in a logical manner. The outcome was a language to deliver origami instructions using speech. The language was then showcased to several people to understand the effectiveness of the language.
HMW Statement
How Might We create a non-visual method of communication to instruct users to follow and make origami structures?
Why oral language, to teach origami?
Currently, the instructions for origami are disseminated through step-by-step instructions accompanied by instructive images, followed by text that further explains the image.
The challenge was to make this multimodal instruction format into a monomodal one.
Objectives of the Experiment
Learning with Audio
Retainability
Application of the learnt language to instruct themselves later
Association of language with shapes
Identifying instruction from the recommended sound
Discover approaches to limit biases in vocabulary creation
Understand the influence of languages known to us to keep it universal
Sounds
Sa, re, ga, ma, pa, dha, ni, saa; |  | |
|---|---|---|
Why these sounds?
The musical notes sa re ga ma and do re mi are understood as the building blocks of music. These sounds are familiar and in the format of a vowel-consonant pair. This gave us the potential to attach two combined instructions in one sound. The vowels indicate an action- aa as open or oo as close. These meanings are denoted based on familiarity and cultural symbolism –
The principle of imitation. The pronunciation of the letters still uses Latin and English sounds.
Creating Oribaka
The language evolved from trying to keep a minimum number of actionable instructions; each unique sounding. We resorted to musical notes to ensure uniqueness. A combination of those sounds formed the basics of ori-baka.
Testing and Evaluation Criteria
The process of conducting the instructional experiments must be informed by the requirements the language must fulfill:
Learnability: Are the users able to learn the language quickly and entirely?
Retainability: Are the users able to retain the language and apply it when instructed to do so?
Apply and create: Are the users able to self-direct after learning the basics of the language?
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