2012 IEEE “Workshop on Engineering Applications”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

1

AINIDIU, CANDI, HELPMI:

ICTs of a personal experience

JADAN GUERRERO, Janio Lincon, IEEE Member 80673916

Centro de Investigación, Innovación y Desarrollo

Universidad Tecnológica Indoamérica

Quito, Ecuador

jjadan@gmail.com

ABSTRACT

This paper presents an overall picture of the current

situation of children with special educational needs (SEN) in

Ecuador and the development of software adapted to our

environment as response to a personal experience of the author.

The paper identifies the typical problems and barriers that parents of children with special educational needs must

overcome in order to achieve social integration. On the other

hand, the paper provides evidence of the methodology used in

determining the requirements and software features. It also

summarizes the essence of depth interviews with experts in

some public and private institutions of disabilities in the city

of Quito.

The paper also explains the software designed for children

with special educational needs, the first is AINIDIU (Agente

Inteligente para Niños con Discapacidad Visual) that has the ability to interact with a blind child through a voice

synthesizer and screen reader. HELPMI (Herramienta que

Emula un Lenguaje de Palabras mediante Imágenes) is a

software for mobile devices or smart phones to support speech

therapists and children with language impairments. Finally,

the web platform CANDI (Centro de Apoyo a Niños

Diferentes – http://www.candi-uti.com) where resources,

information and training programs for parents of SEN children

are centralized.

The principal implication of these technologies is to make

that the SEN children develop cognitive skills to make their integration easier within their familiar and educational

environment.

Keywords: Children with disabilities, Special Education, Inclusive

Education, disabilities, technology, Ecuador

NOMENCLATURE

AGORA: Aulas de Gestión Ocupacional de América Latina.

AINIDIU: Agente Inteligente para niños con discapacidad

visual.

CEFOCLAC: Centro de Formación y Capacitación Laboral

para Ciegos.

CERTEC: Division of Rehabilitation Engineering Research, Department of Design Sciences, Lund Institute of Technology.

FENCE Federación Nacional de Ciegos del Ecuador.

FLASH: Multimedia platform used to add animation, video,

and interactivity.

ICT: Information and communications technology.

JAWS (Job Access with Speech) is a computer screen reader

program.

MSAGENT: Microsoft Agent library.

ONCE: Organización Nacional de Ciegos Españoles.

PDF: Portable Document Format.

SEN: Special educational needs

ULAC: Unión Latinoamericana de Ciegos. UNICEF: United Nations Children's Fund.

USB: Universal Standard Bus.

XML: Extensible Markup Language.

INTRODUCTION

There are no world official statistics concerning the number

of people with disabilities, but the United Nations Fund for

Children (UNICEF) establishes that at least 10% of the world

population has some type of disability, this is 700 million of

individuals, from which 150 and 250 millions are children

with disabilities. In Latin America the number of disabled

people is estimated around 16 millions. (UNICEF, 2011)[14]

In Ecuador there are 1'608,334 people with disabilities

representing 12.14% of the total population, (8%) of the

families of the Sierra region has at least one member with a

disability, which is upper than that of the coastal region (4%)

and that of the Amazon region (6%). From the total infantile

population of Ecuador (0-5 years), children with disabilities

represent 1.4%, 76% of them have some deficiency and 24%

presents a serious limitation regarding their activity.

(CONADIS, INEC 2004)[2]

According to the Ministry of Education and Culture of Ecuador, the 76.2% of the disabled (1'608, 334 people) have

978-1-4673-0870-0/12/$31.00 ©2012 IEEE

2012 IEEE “Workshop on Engineering Applications”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2

no formal education. Of disabled people who study, 58.8% are

in regular education and 6.1% are SEN children who do not

receive any support. It should be mentioned that 37.9% of the

disabled population has not completed any level of education.

(Ministry of Education and Culture of Ecuador, 2005)[15]

One of the biggest problems in Ecuador is that there are not enough schools and professionals so that the integration into

the society of the SEN children can be carried out.

MOTIVATION

The motivation of this research is due to the personal

experience of the author, who has a 10-year-old SEN

daughter.

Carolina was born in Ambato, a small town 120 kilometers

from Quito, Ecuador's capital. She is a wonderful, adorable,

and sweet child with visual and language impairments.

As parents of a special child, we have experienced barriers

both in the family and the society. We have witnessed the lack

of institutions and professionals who can help treat children

with special needs.

Carolina received some therapy since her problem was

detected, however, it was very limited in Ambato and this

forced her family to move to Quito. She received several hours

of therapy a day: Physical, language therapy, hippo therapy

and even dolphin therapy was tested.

Throughout the world children who have disabilities and many

others who experience difficulties in learning have

traditionally been marginalized or excluded from schools, and

Ecuador is not far from this reality.

The problems and frustrations that we experienced every

day gave rise to new opportunities. One of them was the

opportunity to work at the Research Center, Innovation and

Development of Indo America University. As a Computer

Science teacher, I wrote several research projects that can help

Carolina and through them also help parents and children who

are in similar situation.

STATE OF THE ART

This research program began with the search of references

regarding technologic areas used in behalf of SEN children.

This section describes the most important of them:

The United Nations through the Convention on the Rights

of Persons with Disabilities and Optional Protocol establishes

in the Article 7 that "States Members shall take all the

necessary steps to ensure that all children with disabilities

enjoy of all human rights and fundamental freedoms on an equal basis with other children". (United Nations, 2008).[14]

Several social scientists worldwide have conducted research

programs aimed at this vulnerable group of society, for Cirilo:

“Social integration of disabled persons presupposes the

gradual emergence of a culture of non-discrimination of

people with each other, with equal opportunities for all".

Furthermore, this author goes further by stating that "It is a

task for society as a whole to create and promote learning methods to ensure effective integration of the 150 million

disabled children in the world in order to break the gap

judgment inequality of opportunity and destroy the

communication patterns that allow us to live in community”

(Cirilo, 2006)[1].

Sánchez and Hassler say: “The commitment to promote a

society under new cultural parameters of non-discrimination

involves the acquisition of inclusive education policies where

learning is ensured through a constant interaction between

children with and without disabilities”. (Sánchez and Hassler,

2006)

Regarding the importance of incorporating Information and

Communications Technology (ICT) among SEN children,

interviews were conducted with professionals from the main

institutions of the city of Quito who have been working with

disabled people.

For the present study, as the primary source of information

where taken the governmental organizations in the city of

Quito that support the visually impaired as well as a private

institution that incorporates a high percentage of people with visual disabilities in a call center service. The organizations

visited were:

1. FENCE (Federación Nacional de Ciegos del Ecuador).

2. CEFOCLAC (Centro de Formación y Capacitación

Laboral para Ciegos).

3. “Mariana de Jesús” Institute for the Deaf and Blind.

4. RECAPT S.A (Call Center)

FENCE (Federación Nacional de Ciegos del Ecuador)

The National Federation of the Blind of Ecuador is an autonomous organization that brings together institutions and

organizations of and for the blind, that through a controlled

process helps provide training and advice to this group of

people in behalf of their employment and social integration.

FENCE in cooperation with National Organization of

Spanish Blind (ONCE) is developing the program AGORA

(Aulas de Gestión Ocupacional de América Latina), which is

a training project called Occupational Classroom Management

in the Andean Region that is responsible for establishing links

between companies and blind people so that they can be integrated through employment.

Indo America University and the National Federation of the

Blind of Ecuador, in February 2010 signed a specific

2012 IEEE “Workshop on Engineering Applications”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3

agreement for the implementation of this research project. The

purpose of this agreement was to develop an educational

software project for the target group and contact the

University with the most representative organizations of the

country involved within this aspect.

A common feature in these training and consultation centers is the use of JAWS screen reader program, whereby people

with visual disabilities can access digital information with the

help of a computer. This has limited the use and production of

resources in Braille system.

In respect of technology for children with visual

impairment, applications available on the Internet developed

by some foreign organizations like the National Organization

of Spanish Blind (ONCE) where used. This is an entity of

Public Law, democratic and non-profitable that has the

fundamental purpose of improving the quality of life for the

blind and visually impaired in Spain [12] or ULAC (Latin American Blind Union) [13].

CEFOCLAC (Centro de Formación y Capacitación Laboral

para Ciegos)

In order to know the process of "basic-functional

rehabilitation" that people with visual disabilities need to

maintain independence in daily activities of daily living.

Several interviews were conducted with managers and support

staff of that institution. The result was a baseline for the

project shown in this section.

The priority areas CEFOCLAC works with are:

Orientation and mobility training (sensor motor skills

and daily life activities);

Communication (Braille systems, mathematics,

computer and specific programs for blind people);

Specialization (carpet weaving workshops, sewing or

poly functional activities)

In the development areas listed above, people with visual

disabilities develop their other senses and skills and well as techniques and adaptations necessary for their rehabilitation

process. As part of this process, the blind people access to

games such as chess, cards, puzzles, soccer balls and golball1,

tic-tac-toe, among others. Also in the area of specialization

they learn to use power tools such as: Jig, copy keys, as well

as learning technical skills such as electrical and sanitary

facilities to enable them to perform independently in their

daily life.

From the interviews carried out with professionals from

different areas, it can be established that of all them stated that

1 Golfball is an adaptation of traditional soccer game using a ball of sound that allows

the visually impaired person to locate the game.

technology is essential for a better integration of the visually

disabled. It is true that these technologies in our environment

are scarce and expensive, difficult to be acquired by blind

people.

The lack of resources and computer programs oriented to

children with visual impairment and adapted to the reality of our country makes that the development of the software

projects be a must.

“Mariana de Jesús” Institute for the Deaf and Blind

To collect the training needs of visually impaired children,

the observation method was utilized to have the first approach

to the subject matter. The process was carried out as follows:

1. In coordination with the Center direction, the research

group made up of a system engineer, educational

psychologist and a blind person got in touch with the teachers of the school to see how their class where

dictated and how the children interacted in the teaching-

learning process.

2. After the observation, there was a meeting with all the

teachers of the center, i.e. a total of eight professionals,

to collect their classroom experience with the visually

impaired children by using the research team and on the

bases of a pre-established set questions, and others that

arose during the observations, to gather both the needs of

the teachers and those of the children to incorporate them in the software

3. The suggestions made by teachers were the following:

a. To convey their knowledge in the mathematical area,

the teachers use the help of an abacus to allow the

child to abstract the numerical reality. It is therefore

necessary to enlist the help of computer software that

would complement the children's learning in a

flexible and open way.

b. For the teaching of the Braille system and the

children to develop proficiency in reading documents

in this language, teachers use dice, which have the letters of the alphabet marked in bold relief, to build

each word through some games. There are some

software packages in the market that allow printing in

Braille printers, but their high prices make them not

very accessible for blind people.

c. Within the cognitive domain songs or sounds are

used to help internalize the children's ideas. This

competence could also be obtained with the help of a

software program.

d. In the electronic area an approach to the computer is

made with the help of JAWS, however this software requires the use of licenses in Ecuador whose cost of

approximately $1000 USD and being oriented to

adults with visual impairments, there is a level of

2012 IEEE “Workshop on Engineering Applications”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

4

complexity for children who are just beginning to use

a computer.

As a result of such depth interviews, it can be assumed that

the directors and teachers of this institution stated that it would

be very useful a software designed especially for children with

visual impairments, the institution adapts the JAWS software and some programs developed by universities of foreign

institutions, such as "the magic word tree" or "locadia flea"

designed by the National Organization for the Blind of Spain

(ONCE)[12]

The specific needs of the children that the teaching staff

wants to develop in the teaching-learning process in children

with visual impairment can be complemented by the use of

technologies and methodologies focused on software, and it

was evident that there is the need to develop technologies that

meet and support the target group of this project. It has also

been shown that the existing technology focuses mostly on young people and adults. The costs to access this technology

are high and very few of them are developed as free software.

To complement the collected information in this special

school and by looking for answers about what competence the

children with visual impairment should be develop in the

future in their workplace, a visit was coordinated with

AGORA project managers and the investigators to one of the

companies where the blind people had been integrated.

RECAPT S.A

RECAPT SA is a company specialized in logistics services

and Call Center Courier. It has 250 employees, 20 of them

have visual impairments. (RECAPT, 2010).

In the investigation, this company was selected as a pioneer

in the country in the inclusion of a high percentage of people

with visual disabilities in its Service Call Center. In the visit it

was found principally the use technological tools in the

development of activities of the people with visual impairment

in this area and the practical experience of the managers

regarding the inclusion, training and performance of people hired by that enterprise who has visual disabilities as well as

the direct testimony of blind people working in the company.

At the present time 10 people with visual disabilities

between 20 and 35 years old are working and who stated that

the use of electronically tools has allowed them to venture into

different areas of work and improve their living conditions,

supported by reforms of the labor code in force.

RECAPT has an agreement with the AGORA project,

which provides training and licensing of JAWS screen reader (version 9.0 in Spanish) on loan, as support for the

employability of people with visual disabilities.

Through observation and a structured interview with the

manager of the company it became clear that the blind people

can join the productive entity, that companies are increasingly

aware and comply with the Labor Law of Ecuador when

including 4% of its disabled employees, blind people do their

best to be useful for the society and they often perform better

than a normal person, as the manager of the enterprise stated.

In response to this research three platforms have been

developed: AINIDIU (Agente Inteligente para Niños con

Discapacidad Visual) that has the ability to interact with a

blind child through a voice synthesizer and a screen reader.

HELPMI (Herramienta que Emula un Lenguaje de Palabras

mediante Imágenes) is a software for mobile devices or smart

phones to support speech therapists and children with

language impairments. Finally, the web platform CANDI

(Centro de Apoyo a Niños Diferentes – http://www.candi-

uti.com) where resources, information and training programs

for parents of SEN children are centralized

AINIDIU

AINIDIU (Agente Inteligente para NIños con DIscapacidad

visUal) plays the role of computer assistant in training

computer skills of SEN children and visual impairments. The

software interacts with the children through games as a natural

way of learning. Learning new knowledge and skills is very

easy and entertained when playing. The system contains a

number of challenges, and gives children opportunity to

explore and discover. Combined with the possibilities of

modern technologies these great advantages make games a

very powerful educational tool when teaching children.

The process to design and to develop the special software

environment “AINIDIU” is based on these requirements:

1. The target group for the software to be developed is

for children between 5 and 12 years old.

2. The development platform to use is Microsoft Visual

Studio 2008 C# language in order to achieve

portability between different operating systems

(Microsoft Windows XP, Microsoft Windows Vista

and Microsoft Windows 7).

3. The software will be initial free software to be shared by other research groups and can adapt to their needs.

4. The software must provide maximum portability so it

can be run from a USB storage device

5. It uses XML files to structure its information. This

will facilitate portability to any computer instead of a

database motor.

6. It uses the Microsoft Agent System module that

enables agents or assistants that will convert Text

into Speech.

7. The software applies basic key combination such as

ARROWS, ENTER, SPACEBAR, TAB, PAGE UP, PAGE DOWN, HOME, END, and DELETED. Also

2012 IEEE “Workshop on Engineering Applications”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

5

key combinations are used to achieve the program

commands in JAWS to get familiarized with it.

8. The contents of the software is structured into the

following categories:

a. Child's basic information such as name, date

of birth, family details, likes and

preferences. b. Story reading and PDF files

c. Organized with sounds of numbers, letters,

animals and objects.

d. Simple games that allows interaction with

other children

9. The agent has a feedback module that allows

interactivity and "learning" based on information

indicated by the child.

10. It has a basic module for Screen Reader so that it can

be introduced into the JAWS environment.

Figure 1: General outline of AINIDIU software.

HELPMI

HELPMI (Herramienta que Emula un Lenguaje de

Palabras Mediante Imágenes) is a software that emulates a

language of words, in order to help a child with language

impairment. This software displays a set of images, some of

them customized to the child (e.g., photograph, photographs of

their parents or objects of his own home). In the screen the

child selects multiple images and the computer interprets them

to generate a synthesized voice sentence in a mobile device.

The software uses a pictographic communication system designed as an application for an iPad or smart phone that will

be used by children with disabilities who can express

themselves with greater agility and efficiency.

To carry out this project it was necessary to visit two therapy centers in the north of the city. In addition, we

interviewed teachers from two schools working on the

integration of special children, including Carolina, our

daughter.

HELPMI is an augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) a software application for mobile

devices. HELPMI is designed primarily for children with

emerging communication skills and developmental delays. It

has two modes: administrator and user modes. In the

administrator mode, HELPMI can be customized to show

some buttons on the screen. The administrator (parent or therapist) can also use the administrator mode to create new

buttons and record related audio for each button. In the user

mode, HELPMI allows him to communicate in the same way

as he/she would do with a traditional AAC device.

HELPMI enables people with speech disabilities to improve their personal autonomy, by allowing communication with the

rest of the people. By using this tool, the user has access to

simple, intuitive menus through which discloses quickly and

efficiently at all times what he means, needs and concerns.

Figure 2: General outline of HELPMI software.

CANDI

CANDI (Centro de Apoyo a Niños DIferentes) is a web

platform that allows the diffusion of technological innovations

and services to people with special educational needs. It was designed to provide information and direction on resources

and referrals.

As a result of this project Indo America University signed an agreement with Ecuadorian author Juan Carranza, author of

children's literature to create audio books, among which is

created "El duendecito del sombrero grande".

2012 IEEE “Workshop on Engineering Applications”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

6

Figure 3: Web Platform CANDI http://www.candi-uti.com

CONCLUSIONS

In this paper, a personal experience has been presented which motivated the development of software program that ensures the software meets the needs of the SEN children, being both accessible and usable.

Additionally, we have established the state of art in Quito, capital of Ecuador and have been shown that in Ecuador there is little software development in this area.

The technologies developed in Indo America University are a collaborative group of family members, friends and students seeking to promote help to SEN children. By following the results outlined in this paper, we hope that much of the problems associated with the integration of SEN children will be solved.

Lately the university has started new research programs focused on the evaluation of these tools in other focus groups. It has also made an approach to the Vice President of the Republic of Ecuador to make available these technologies and strengthen their social assistance programs.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This research would not have been possible without the

valuable collaboration of public and private institutions

through their openness and collaboration, led to the design and

dissemination of the software for SEN Children. The assiduous work of the professionals: Engineer Hugo Arias

whose professional experience and visual impairment was a

bulwark in the research process, and psychologist Ileana

Altamirano, responsible for conducting the psychological tests

of the study group. Special acknowledgement for Carolina for

allowing us to present her case as the core of this research

program.

REFERENCES

[1] Cirilo (2006). Innovación pedagógica en la integración social con personas con discapacidad. Extraído el 14 de Abril de 2008 desde: www.educalibre.cl/node/665

[2] CONADIS. Consejo Nacional de Discapacidades. Datos estadísticos. Disponible en Internet: http://www.conadis.gov.ec/provincias.php

[3] Cernuzzi, L., Grau, I. & Sánchez, J. (2003). Assistant Agents for Improving Learning of Visual Impaired Child. In D. Lassner & C. McNaught (Eds.), Proceedings of World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications 2003 (pp. 467-470). Chesapeake, VA: AACE.

[4] Cernuzzi, L., Paniagua, J., Chenú, R., “Club de Othello, un desafío para niños con discapacidad visual”. (accepted paper) 3º Congreso Iberoamericano de Tecnologías de Apoyo para la Discapacidad - IBERDISCAP 2004, San José, Costa Rica, Marzo 2004.

[5] González, E., Boudel, A. (1994). Enfoque Sistemático de la educación del niño con discapacidad visual. De. Actilibro SA., BS. As.

[6] Joel Francia H, docente Universitario, instructor, consultor y desarrollador de aplicaciones .NET. con certificaciones MCAD, MCSD, MCT, y es además MVP en C# .NET, experto en el desarrollo de aplicaciones distribuidas, implementaciones de Servicios Web, .NET Remoting, XML y la implementación y el uso de patrones UML para el desarrollo de aplicaciones .NET usando Building Blocasy UML.Merabet, L. B., Sánchez J. (2009). Desplazamiento basado en audio utilizando entornos virtuales: cuando la tecnología se combina con la neurociencia. AER Journal: Research and Practice in Visual Impairment and Blindness. Pp. 128-137.

[7] Microsoft Corporation. Microsoft Agent, MSDN http://msdn.microsoft.com

[8] Sánchez J., Lumbreras M., Cernuzzi L., “Interactive Virtual Acoustis Environments for Blind Children: Computing, Usability and Cognition”. Seattle, Washington (USA), 31 March – 5 April, 2001.

[9] Sánchez, j. (2005). Una metodología para desarrollar y evaluar la usabilidad de entornos virtuales basados en audio para el aprendizaje y la cognición de usuarios ciegos. Universidad de Chile.

[10] Sjöström C. (2002). Non – Visual Haptic Interaction Design: Guidelines and Aplications. Doctoral Dissertation CERTEC, LTH. Number 2.

[11] ONCE (Organización Nacional de Ciegos Españoles)

http://www.once.es

[12] ULAC (Unión Latinoamericana de Ciegos

http://www.fbu.edu.uy/ulac/

[13] UNICEF (Fondo de Naciones Unidas para la Infancia)

http://www.unicef.org/spanish/

[14] Ministerio de Educación y Cultura del Ecuador

www.educarecuador.ec/upload/EducacionEspecial.pdf

[15] Mel Ainscow and Memmenasha Haile-Giorgis, “The Education of Children with Special Needs: Barriers and Opportunities”, UNICEF, 1998

[16] http://www.expressiveapp.com/

[17] http://www.tecnoaccesible.net/node/215 [18] http://momswithapps.com/apps-for-special-needs/

2012 IEEE “Workshop on Engineering Applications”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

7

BIOGRAPHY

Janio Jadán Guerrero, was born in Ambato, Ecuador on May 6, 1968, gained his degree in Computer Engineering at the Central University of Ecuador in 1997. He obteinded a scholarship from the Foundation for Science and Technology FUNDACYT for his expertise in computer science atained in Costa Rica University during the period 1998 and 2000

UNESCO awarded him a scholarship program for Research Fellowships Programme in 2002. In 2003 he gained his

Master’s degree in Business Administration and Marketing at Indo America University.

Since 2000, he has been working as a professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador in Ambato, Indo America University and Technical University of Ambato, where he taught various subjects namely: Programming, Web Applications, Mobile Applications, Artificial Intelligence, Computer Simulation and Educational Platforms. He has been a Junior Member of the Institute of Electrical Engineers, Electronic and Computer (IEEE) since 1998, where he has participated in several conferences in Mexico, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama.

In January 2012 he won the first prize in UTCiencias 2012, where he supported the project "ICTs for Children with Special Educational Needs".