WO2013013034A2

WO2013013034A2 - Method for collecting, image processing and disseminating student work results using a document camera through an interactive social network

Info

Publication number: WO2013013034A2
Application number: PCT/US2012/047389
Authority: WO
Inventors: Ji Shen
Original assignee: Pathway Innovations & Technologies
Priority date: 2011-07-19
Filing date: 2012-07-19
Publication date: 2013-01-24
Also published as: WO2013013034A3

Abstract

Disclosed is a an educational presentation system having a tablet and a primary image capturing device connected to the tablet. The tablet includes a processor that identifies contents of an image captured by the image capture device and that executes steps in response to and based on a type of contents identified. A projector can be added to the presentation system. A method for providing a web-based academic social network page.

Description

METHOD FOR COLLECTING, IMAGE PROCESSING AND DISSEMINATING STUDENT WORK RESULTS USING A DOCUMENT CAMERA THROUGH AN

INTERACTIVE SOCIAL NETWORK

This application claims priority to United States Provisional Application No. 61/509,197, which was filed in the United States on July 19, 201 1, and the entirety of this application is incorporated by reference.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present subject matter relates to collection, storage and management of student work results.

BACKGROUND

Today, the majority of student work results, such as homework, class work, drawings or crafts, handwritings, quizzes, tests, exams, and handwritten essays, are still in paper form. Such student work results are difficult to capture and maintain electronically, despite obvious value. For example, traditional scantron machines not only require special paper forms, but are highly expensive, labor intensive, and error prone. Traditional flatbed scanners are costly, labor intensive, and error prone. Proprietary assessment data analysis and reporting software require specialized online or offline software; these products are primarily designed for administrators in education, and thus do not enable the involvement of parents, teachers, and students.

Existing systems cannot provide sufficient volumes of everyday 'real-time' data as work products are created; they can typically only capture major exam data, such as district wide standardized test information. Data collected at such stages is only of value for "after- the-fact" reporting, leading to missed opportunities for early intervention to help students at the first sign of issues or weaknesses in their learning process.

Conventional methods for collecting student work results require centralized high speed scanning technologies to process voluminous amount of paper into digital forms. The work is expensive, labor intensive, error prone, and time consuming. The monetary and time cost associated with the digitization process far outweighs the potential benefit of capturing such student work in digital form. As a result, such important data has never been available for teachers, parents, or students.

SUMMARY

Capturing student work can be highly valuable in several areas and applications. For example: 1. The collection, storage, and management of student work information can build the foundation of a "student portfolio."

2. Teachers can have a quick and thorough snapshot of any student's learning results, and are better enabled to conduct analysis of class or individual student's performance.

3. Educational administrators can have assessment data available for every student, every class, every school, and district for analysis and reporting purposes. This can be the quantitative basis for early intervention.

4. Teachers, parents, and students can all communicate in a social network setting

focusing on the students' learning and development with quantitative information, images, other multimedia data, and interactive tools.

The present subject matter employs a classroom level document camera device used in conjunction with personal computing devices, with a potentially personalized student camera device, which can be used daily to capture, process, store, manage, and distribute student works in process, as the works are finished, in real time and in a non-intrusive fashion.

A first embodiment of the inventive subject matter is an educational presentation system having a tablet and a primary image capturing device connected to the tablet. The tablet includes a processor that identifies contents of an image captured by the image capture device and that executes steps in response to and based on a type of contents identified. A projector can be added to the presentation system. The projector is selectively operable to display the captured images on a surface remote from the system. The tablet can include a motion detection component that recognizes and interprets handwriting motions. The handwriting motions can convey language to the system or commands such as image rotation, zooming, panning, and cropping. Special insignia can be added into the image so that the originator of the image can be identified.

The tablet can have a touch sensitive screen and the processor can be configured to rotate, zoom, pan, and crop the captured images in response to signals received from the touch sensitive screen. A second image capturing device can be added to the tablet. This second image capturing device can be used for capturing images such as images of the tablet's user, of the environment in which the tablet is being used or any other image of interest. The images that are captured by the second image capturing device can be displayed in a single projection simultaneously with images captured by the primary image capturing device.

A second embodiment of the present subject matter is an academic transmission and response system. The system includes a tablet computer that has a touch sensitive screen, a transmitter, a receiver and a limited function transmitter. The limited function transmitter is configured to wirelessly transmit only one of a predetermined number of transmissions when prompted by the tablet.

The limited function transmitter can includes an independent touch sensitive screen. The independent touch sensitive screen can display images that can be annotated via a user's touch and the annotations can be transmitted in real-time to the tablet computer's touch sensitive screen.

The tablet computer can also include an image projection device, which is either independent of the tablet or integrated within the tablet. The image projection device projects either an image appearing on the tablet computer's touch sensitive screen or an image appearing on the independent touch sensitive screen or both images simultaneously.

A handwriting recognition component is contained within the tablet computer and is configured to recognize handwriting motion written on an external surface. The handwriting recognition component can recognize a type of language being written on the external surface, i.e., English, Chinese, German, Etc. A hand gesture recognition component can be included to recognize sign language.

The tablet computer is configured to immediately judge upon receipt transmissions received from the limited function transmitter as a correct or incorrect response.

A yet further embodiment of the present subject matter is a method for providing a web-based academic social network page. Steps for the method (in no required order) include providing a digital academic profile portion of the web page, providing a gallery portion on the web page, identifying and examining academic information, identifying an originator of academic information, automatically uploading results of the examination of academic information to the social network page, uploading academic improvement suggestions to the social network page, creating a student portfolio based on the academic information and results of the examining of the academic information and providing accessibility of the student portfolio and at least one additional student's portfolio to educational administrators for having assessment data available for each student, each student's class, each student's school, and each student's school district for analysis and reporting purposes.

The web page provides various academic information about a student. The gallery portion originates with a document imaging camera imaging all academic information relating to a student and storing it in a non-transitory medium contained within the imaging camera. The academic information can be a student's academic statistics, completed examinations, currently pending examinations, literary works, contact information, academic biography, academic news, academic events, awards, and recommendations. The academic improvement suggestions are determined based on the results of the examining of the academic information.

Information can be stored in a local non-transitory medium contained within the system; it can be stored within a remote non-transitory medium and it can be stored within a cloud server that is configured as an interactive social network.

A yet further embodiment of the present subject matter is an interactive whiteboard system. The interactive whiteboard system includes a tablet. The tablet includes an image capturing device, an image projection device and a processor. The processor can recognize, interpret and take action in response to indicia contained within an image captured by the image capturing device. The processor also detects changes to the images and projects the changes onto a remote surface to the image via the projection device. The motion detection device can detect handwriting gestures on a surface external to the interactive whiteboard system. At least one of the indicia can be a user identification code, a student examination, and an educational lesson.

A limited function mechanism is wirelessly connected to the interactive whiteboard system. The limited function mechanism can be limited to transmitting a single transmission in response to a whiteboard system prompt.

BRIEF DESCRIPTIONS OF DRAWINGS

Fig. 1 shows a document camera of the present system;

Fig. 2a - 2e show a personal computer, laptop and tablet independently and integrally connected to a document camera;

Fig. 3 shows an alternate document camera for use with the present system;

Fig. 4 shows an example collection, processing, storage and management flowchart of the present system;

Fig. 5 shows an illustrative academic social network having a whiteboard system, a cloud server, a projection device and a tablet;

Fig. 6 shows a tablet device;

Fig. 7 shows an alternative configuration of the tablet device; and

Fig. 8 shows a system having a limited response transmitter.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The present inventive subject matter uses a, compact document camera for teachers and potential students to capture student work in process. The document camera 2 is personalizable, based on the user or usage. For example, a camera for teachers may be configured differently than for students, or for parents. Configuration variations of the camera includes image capture size variations, camera height variations, viewable field dimensions, variable resolution, variable processing settings, etc. These configurations may be made based on the general user type, i.e. teachers, students, parents, or may be further personalized by the individual user and their additional preferences.

Students complete their work on a paper sheet marked with an individualized, which is then directly submitted for capture by the document camera 2, the lens 4 of which physically hovers above the student work. In this configuration, the system may require more manual settings or adjustment, but may be more portable or used for capturing student work that may exceed the dimensions of any appropriate receiving device owned by the user . An illustrative document camera is shown in Fig. 1 with a document receiving tray.

By using a document camera, the student work may be accurately captured regardless of whether the work is any combination of text, pictures, graphics, free-form text, bubble or check form, circled answer selection, etc. The work may be black and white, grayscale or color. The work may also be multi-dimensional.

Further, if the work includes color, a graphic, picture or photo, or is multi-dimensional, image processing may also include color corrections such as brightness and contrast adjustments, color mapping, color balancing, quantization, or color translation to a different color space, recovery of a full image from a raw image format using a Bayer filter pattern, digital compositing or optical compositing, interpolation, demosaicing, image registration, image differencing and morphing, image segmentation, high dynamic range imaging by combining multiple images, etc. as appropriate. The image processing used may be pre- configured or selected at the time of use.

Image processing includes a variety of image processing techniques, including optical character recognition (OCR) processing, the text of which can further be automatically archived and/or tagged to enable future searching and analysis. The image processing may also include image recognition, such as text extraction by partial or complete OCR, checkbox or bubble value extraction using optical mark recognition, enlargement, reduction, rotation, geometric hashing for 2-D object recognition with affine invariance, sorting, data tagging, etc.

With respect to a method of practicing the inventive subject matter and referring to the flowchart in Fig. 3, at step 1002, a teacher batch prints "answer sheets" with student ID code(s). The ID code discussed above is unique for each student, and may additionally be distinguishable for specific school grades, periods or subjects. Alternatively, the ID codes could be generated separately from and affixed to any type of material, (even a three- dimensional object) thereby making it an "answer sheet."

At steps 1004 and 1006, students complete their work on the ID marked paper sheets, which are then submitted into the receiving device 6. The dimensions, capacity, receiving sheet size and thickness of the receiving device may vary, and may be fixed, or may be customizable based on the student sheets to be received. The receiving device 6 may be operated by the teacher, the students, or other personnel. The feeding operation may be manual or fully automated. For example, a teacher, student or other person may feed student work sheets in one sheet at a time. Alternatively, the receiving device could accept or comprise an auto-feed tray attachment for automatic feeding of one or more sheets.

The document camera 2 captures images of the work paper sheets upon receiving a signal from the sensor of the receiving tray 6. Thus, at step 1008, the images are captured in automatic fashion. This further enables easy operation of the receiving device 6 and document camera system by users of all ages and physical capabilities, with minimal involvement or adjustment at time of use to decrease time needed and increase the volume of student work processed in a short duration.

At step 1010, a personal computer 301 , tablet 206 (shown in Fig. 2a - 2d) or other processing device that is electronically connected to the document camera 2 or 206 (via direct, indirect, proximal or non-proximal connection) performs Student ID recognition. At step

1012, software on the personal computer or other processing device automatically associates student work by Student ID to a student user or "account." The software also organizes, stores and further manages the student work. For example, the software assigns permissions, based on the type of work, work content, or user settings, for further data access.

A cloud server 1 106 (shown in Fig. 5) is available for primary or secondary (i.e. backup) storage. The storage may be dedicated, shared, general or personalized. At step 1014, the system populates personal spaces on a dedicated "Cloud Server" with captured student work in digital form. The previously configured permissions or additional permissions would be used to control access to the student work.

At step 1016, the personal spaces may be accessed by the respective administrators, parents and students associated with the student work, or teachers, parents and students may access both their own or other parties' personal space in a social network configuration. For example, the personal spaces may capture data view information and display that information to the respective administrators, parents and students associated with the student work.

At step 1018, in the social network configuration, teachers, parents and students may exchange comments, perform analyses, and "interact" with the student work, its associated data and with each other. This further enables real-time review, feedback, interaction and communication

A handwriting recognition component is contained within the tablet and is configured to recognize handwriting motion written on an external surface. The handwriting recognition component is can recognize a type of language being written on the external surface, i.e., English, Chinese, German, Etc. A hand gesture recognition component can be included to recognize sign language.

The processing may optionally perform answer recognition, for example, if the teacher or other supervising user has appropriately inputted the questions, expected answer types, steps, content or positions corresponding to the work product. The processing may also then create corresponding grades, which may be scaled or curved, depending on user input of acceptable answer alternatives, whether partial credit is available, the desired grading scale, minimum requirements, number of expected student or paper submissions, grading criteria or factors, etc. Additional complex desired forms of image processing may be performed if chosen.

Integrated image recognition processing software automatically associates student work with student, teacher, and class information, tags or sorts digital copies of the student work accordingly, so that data is automatically organized, stored, and managed for future access and dissemination. Optionally, the management can include triggered access and dissemination. For example, users may have individual accounts that are configured so that if a specific teacher, student or class user has a new work document associated with their account, a copy of the work document, data related to the work document or other information is automatically emailed or a notification is sent to an associated account email, telephone number or through another contact method.

A method for providing a web-based academic social network page includes the steps of uploading academic improvement suggestions to the social network page and providing accessibility of the student portfolio and at least one additional student's portfolio to educational administrators for having assessment data available for each student, each student's class, each student's school, and each student's school district for analysis and reporting purposes.

A gallery portion originates with a document imaging camera imaging all academic information and storing it in a non-transitory medium contained within the imaging camera. The academic information can be a student's academic statistics, completed examinations, currently pending examinations, literary works, contact information, academic biography, academic news, academic events, awards, and recommendations. The academic improvement suggestions are determined based on the results of the examining of the academic information.

Once the student work is collected, information is uploaded to a cloud computing server system organized and made accessible through permission managed online "personal spaces" for all interested parties, i.e., teachers, parents, and students. All interested parties will have their respective and differentiated "view" or processing functionality against the collected "student work" data. All parties will be able to communicate with the relevant data, and have interactive views of the data, and can interact with each other regarding the data. Such an interactive "view" and interaction amongst user parties, constitutes a method of forming a social network specialized for teaching, learning, and parent involvement in a student's development.

The collected data can then be utilized in specialized or existing social networking settings to enable teachers, parents, and students to interact and communicate about the student's work. For example, certain data can be downloaded to spreadsheet form for additional analysis, or the analysis functionality can be built in and its outputs (whether text, chart, graphical, etc.) can be downloaded to other software programs or devices for additional analysis and communication if desired. Student work can be "shared" or "posted" to existing social networks if the student account is configured appropriately and the permission settings enable such sharing or posting.

The present student work capture system and method enables one, at any time of a person's lifetime, to look back at various academic developmental stages he/she has gone through, with all of the actual images of that person's work present. The complete images present the information in a very accessible, user-friendly and processing friendly format. Additionally, because the student work capture is a complete image or set of images, additional information not captured per se, may be recollected or the student's memory reminded of related information by association. With reference to Fig. 5, an educational presentation system 202 has a tablet 204 and a primary image capturing device 206 connected to the tablet 204. The tablet 204 includes a processor that identifies contents of an image captured by the image capture device and that executes steps in response to and based on a type of contents identified, A projector 208 can be added to the system 204. The projector 208 is selectively operable to display the captured images on a surface 206 remote from the system.

The tablet 204 includes a motion detection component that recognizes and interprets handwriting motions. The handwriting motions can convey language to the system or commands such as image rotation, zooming, panning, and cropping. The tablet has a touch sensitive screen 210 (shown in Fig. 6) and the processor can rotate, zoom, pan, and crop the captured images in response to signals received from the touch sensitive screen.

A second image capturing device 310 (shown in Fig. 3) can be added to the document having camera. This second image capturing device 310 would capture images such of, for example, the tablet's user, the environment in which the tablet is being used or any other image of interest. The images that are captured by the second image capturing device can be displayed in a single projection simultaneously with images captured by the primary image capturing device.

With reference to Fig. 8, an academic transmission and response system includes a tablet 802 that has a touch sensitive screen 804, a transmitter 806, a receiver and a limited function transmitter 808. To reduce costs, the tablet 802 can be made without the touch sensitive screen. The limited function transmitter is configured to wirelessly transmit only one of a predetermined number of transmissions when prompted by the tablet. For example, if a teacher asks for a response to a certain question, the student's limited function transmitter 808 is governed by the teacher's tablet so that only a response to that specific question can be submitted. Alternatively, the limited function transmitter 808 has an independent touch sensitive screen (not shown). The independent touch sensitive screen displays images that can be annotated via a user's touch and the annotations can be transmitted in real-time to the tablet's touch sensitive screen.

The tablet computer also includes an image projection device. The image projection device is either independent of the tablet or integrated into the tablet. The image projection device projects at least one of an image appearing on the tablet computer's touch sensitive screen or an image appearing on the independent touch sensitive screen or both images simultaneously. The tablet computer, using relevant algorithms, immediately judges a student's answers upon receipt of transmissions from the limited function transmitter as a correct or incorrect response. Algorithms specific to the a teacher's lesson are downloadable into the tablet or can be maintained in a cloud.

An interactive whiteboard system (shown generally in Fig. 5) includes a tablet 802 or 204 (shown, for example in Fig. 8 and 2b - 2d). The tablet 802, 204 includes an image capturing device 206 or 202, an image projection device 208 (shown, for example, in Fig. 5) and a processor. The processor can recognize, interpret and take action in response to indicia contained within an image captured by the image capturing device. The processor also detects changes to the images and projects the changes to the image via the projection device onto a remote surface. The motion detection device can detect handwriting gestures on a surface external to the interactive whiteboard system. At least one of the indicia can be a user identification code, a student examination, and an educational lesson.

What has been described above includes examples of one or more embodiments. It is, of course, not possible to describe every conceivable combination of components or methodologies for purposes of describing the aforementioned embodiments, but one of ordinary skill in the art may recognize that many further combinations and permutations of various embodiments are possible. Accordingly, the described embodiments are intended to embrace all such alterations, modifications and variations that fall within the spirit and scope of the appended claims. Furthermore, to the extent that the term "includes" is used in either the detailed description or the claims, such term is intended to be inclusive in a manner similar to the term "comprising" as "comprising" is interpreted when employed as a transitional word in a claim.

It will be understood that many additional changes in the details, materials, steps and arrangement of parts, which have been herein described and illustrated to explain the nature of the invention, may be made by those skilled in the art within the principal and scope of the invention as expressed in the appended claims.

Claims

I Claim:

1. A system comprising:

a tablet; and

a primary image capturing device connected to the tablet,

wherein the tablet comprises a processor for identifying contents of an image captured by the image capture device and for executing steps in response to and based on a type of contents identified.

2. The system as recited in claim 1 the system further comprising an image projector selectively operable by a user to display the captured images on a surface remote from the system.

3. The system as recited in claim 2 wherein the tablet further comprises a motion detection component configured to recognize handwriting motions on the surface remote from the system;

wherein the processor is configured to rotate, zoom, pan, and crop the captured images in response to handwriting motions.

4. The system as recited in claim 1 wherein the processor is configured to identify an originator of the contents of the captured image based on indicia within the image and wherein the processor is further configured to interpret the contents of the captured image.

5. The system as recited in claim 1 wherein the tablet comprises a touch sensitive screen and wherein the processor is configured to rotate, zoom, pan, and crop the captured images in response to signals received from the touch sensitive screen.

6. The system as recited in claim 1 wherein the tablet further comprises a second image capturing device configured to capture an image of a user of the tablet.

7. The system as recited in claim 6 wherein the processor is configured to display images that are captured by the second image capturing device in a single projection simultaneously with images captured by the primary image capturing device.

8. An academic transmission and response system comprising

a tablet computer having a touch sensitive screen, a transmitter and a receiver; and a limited function transmitter configured to wirelessly transmit only one of a predetermined number of transmissions when prompted by the tablet.

9. An academic transmission and response system as recited in claim 8 wherein the

limited function transmitter comprises an independent touch sensitive screen.

10. An academic transmission and response system as recited in claim 9 wherein the independent touch sensitive screen comprises images that can be annotated via a user's touch, the annotations transmitted in real-time to the tablet computer's touch sensitive screen.

1 1. An academic transmission and response system as recited in claim 10 wherein the tablet computer further comprises an integrated image projection device for projecting on an external surface at least one of an image appearing on the tablet computer's touch sensitive screen or an image appearing on the independent touch sensitive screen or both images simultaneously.

12. An academic transmission and response system as recited in claim 1 1 further

comprising a handwriting recognition component configured to recognize handwriting motion written on an external surface.

13. An academic transmission and response system as recited in claim 12 wherein the handwriting recognition component is configured to recognize a type of language being written on the external surface.

14. An academic transmission and response system as recited in claim 8 wherein the tablet computer is configured to immediately judge upon receipt transmissions received from the limited function transmitter as a correct or incorrect response.

15. A method for providing a web-based academic social network page comprising:

providing a digital academic profile portion configured to provide various academic information about a student; and

providing a gallery portion, wherein the gallery portion originates with a document imaging camera imaging all academic information and storing it in a non-transitory medium contained within the imaging camera;

wherein the academic information comprises at least one of a student's academic statistics, completed examinations, currently pending examinations, literary works, contact information, academic biography, academic news, academic events, awards, and

recommendations .

16. An method for providing a web-based academic social network page as recited in claim

15 further comprising the step of identifying and examining the academic information.

17. An method for providing a web-based academic social network page as recited in claim

16 further comprising identifying an originator of the academic information.

18. An method for providing a web-based academic social network page as recited in claim 17 further comprising automatically uploading results of the examining of the academic information to the social network page.

19. An method for providing a web-based academic social network page as recited in claim 18 further comprising uploading improvement suggestions to the social network page, wherein the improvement suggestions are determined based on the results of the examining of the academic information.

20. An method for providing a web-based academic social network page as recited in claim

19 further comprising creating a student portfolio based on the academic information and results of the examining of the academic information.

21. An system as in claim 15, wherein the storage system comprises a cloud server

configured as an interactive social network.

22. An method for providing a web-based academic social network page as recited in claim

20 further comprising providing accessibility of the student portfolio and at least one additional student's portfolio to educational administrators for having assessment data available for each student, each student's class, each student's school, and each student's school district for analysis and reporting purposes.

23. An interactive whiteboard system comprising

a tablet, the tablet comprising an image capturing device, an image projection device and a processor;

wherein the processor is configured to recognize, interpret and take action in response to indicia contained within an image, the image captured by the image capturing device, and wherein the tablet further comprises a motion detection device for detecting

handwriting gestures on a surface external to the interactive whiteboard system.

24. An interactive whiteboard system as recited in claim 23 wherein the processor is further configured to detect changes to the images and project the changes to the image via the projection device.

25. An interactive whiteboard system as recited in claim 24 wherein at least one of the indicia is selected from the group consisting of a user identification code, a student examination, and an educational lesson.

26. An interactive whiteboard system as recited in claim 25 further comprising a limited function mechanism wirelessly connected to the interactive whiteboard system, wherein the limited function mechanism is configured to transmit a single transmission in response to a whiteboard system prompt.

27. An interactive whiteboard system as recited in claim 23 wherein the processor is configured to recognize and differentiate the handwritten language from a plurality of types of languages.