LEARNING SYSTEM

• US 20140127667A1
• Filed: 10/31/2013
• Published: 05/08/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 11/05/2012
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Digitally Different Srl
• Original Assignee: Digitally Different Srl
• Inventors: Iannacone, Marco
• Application Number:
  US14/069,130
• Publication Number:
  US 20140127667A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 434/379
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 5/02 with visual presentation of the material to be studied, e.g. using film strip

Abstract

A tablet interface learning device includes school books, narrative books, comics and written material on the device selectively are loaded and there is a scanner with automatic document feeder for acquiring document. There is a user interface (UI) screen, the interface screen having big icons, each of the icons occupying about 15 and 30% of the interface screen. A text to speech functionality includes an ebook that can be read aloud by the device itself, and includes an icon of the ebook toolbar to activate the text to speech starting from the first word of the shown page. An education or studying method and system includes a mapping tool representing the main concepts of a topic to study.

Claims

1. An education method comprising hardware and software platform having a tablet device, the tablet interface being a primary learning device;

and selectively a scanner with automatic document feeder for acquiring documents;

comprises the steps of

loading at least one of a school book, narrative book, comic or written material on the device selectively by at least one of wifi, usb or microsd card;

providing a user interface screen, the interface screen having icons, each of the icons occupying between about 10 and 30% of the interface screen, and the size selectively being dependent on implementation; and

selectively providing the interface with a functionality of parental control that allows a teacher or parent to choose the application for a student, and other applications essentially being non-available visually on the device.

2. The method as claimed in claim 1 including providing a panel, selectively PIN protected, for permitting a teacher or parent to configure the device with different programs or to access other available applications to allow the student to play, selectively as a recognition/reward, for work, or selectively providing a game or reward dependent on student results.

3. The method as claimed in claim 1 including providing an agenda with recording/dictating capabilities, school timetable, different colors, alarms/reminders to simplify the process for a student to take notes and not forget homework, and optionally wherein in a view mode, homework in the traditional week view is shown, and also in a single to do list where homework is listed in a chronological order according to the due date.

4. The method as claimed in claim 3 wherein in edit mode the method works in a way where the user is permitted to choose a day by selecting in the week/month view and typing a homework with details;

and selectively additionally homework is added by recording on the current day and permitting a student to listen again.

5. The method as claimed in claim 4 wherein in both modes homework is read aloud by the tablet.

6. The method as claimed in claim 1 including an ebook reader functional to reproduce common digital format selectively as txt, HTML, epub, PDF or rtf.

7. The method as claimed in claim 3 wherein the ebook reader includes a touch interface to permit browsing ebooks which once opened, is the essentially only thing shown on the screen.

8. The method as claimed in claim 1 including a toolbar with the different commands to perform on an ebook, and being visible if the screen is touched for a prolonged time, and in the absence of actions, disappears whereby there are essentially no distractions on the screen, the screen being essentially filled by the ebook.

9. The method as claimed in claim 1 including a text to speech functionality, whereby an ebook is read aloud by the device, and including an icon of the ebook toolbar to activate the text to speech starting from the first word of a shown page.

10. The method as claimed in claim 1 including a reading aloud function, a stop function before the completion of a page by pressing a specific icon;

a pause and restart function, and wherein reading speed is increased or decreased according to a student preference.

11. The method as claimed in claim 3 wherein the ebook reader includes a karaoke functionality that visually highlights on screen the sentence being read by a text to speech engine.

12. The method as claimed in claim 1 including an on-screen keyboard with dictating feature, an on-the-fly spell checker of what is typed, highlighting relative to an internal dictionary, and an option for read aloud and optionally including a mapping tool to permit representing concepts of a topic needed to study in a map.

13. The method as claimed in claim 1 including optional glasses with camera, selectively as a head mounted display, enabled to augment perceived reality by enrichment with additional intelligible information, and enabled to recognize written text, capture text and read text aloud.

14. The method as claimed in claim 1 including a multi-language dictionary operable as a standalone application or invoked within a different application, selectively an ebook reader, and selectively the dictionary performs a search as you type feature that shows on the fly words matching the inserted letters, and optionally wherein once found the word, and the word definition is shown on a screen with hyperlinks to other words mentioned in the definition, and selectively the definition and selectively the searched word is read aloud by pressing an icon

15. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein students start learning by opening a digital diary to find homework, and selectively a direct link to the digital schoolbook specific page and passing to the disclosed ebook reader to open at a proper place to start the reading and optionally wherein for reading within the reader the student is enabled to:

highlight a sentence with different color;

add a written note and which is selectively shown as a colored sticky note on the page;

add a vocal, selectively recorded, note; and

draw lines, circles, square around text and/or images.

16. The method claimed in claim 1 including providing a tool for math exercises, and including two different talking calculators, selectively for primary school:

including choosing a talking abacus to perform a calculation, when a number is composed on the abacus, by pressing a specific icon, and the number is read aloud;

providing a calculation tool, selectively shaped as 4 pair of hands to perform calculations, wherein selectively students move fingers up or down to compose a number read aloud on student request; and

providing a calculator with talking functionality and a log where inserted operation is shown with the primary school traditional representation.

17. The method as claimed in claim 1 including providing a tool for math exercises, and including two different talking calculators, selectively for secondary school, and:

providing an advanced scientific talking calculator, and selectively providing a log where previously inputted calculus is tracked and for being re-read aloud;

providing a notebook containing the main formulas from geometry to algebra, the notebook containing formulas and selectively formulas being searchable within a notebook with a search engine and added by students; and

providing math notebook with a formula writer.

18. The method as claimed in claim 1 including permitting after reading a lesson, a memorization functionality, using the mapping software to create a visual representation of the topic to be learnt.

19. The method as claimed in claim 1 wherein the mapping program has two different mode of use, selectively:

edit mode which allow the student to build a map; and

view mode which allows student to study the map; and

the possibility to switch from edit mode to view mode with a single tap.

20. The method as claimed in claim 1 including touching a single node to show dots in a direction the map develops;

tapping on a dot to connect and create a new node in that direction; and

double tapping on a node to open the node properties page from which students can;

type the node title

associate an image to the node, selectively selecting the image from the one already on or downloading it from Google

add a description to the node

add a vocal note to the node

selectively select a specific shape of the node, a border size/color, a filling color, a node font and size and optionally wherein when a map is created, to permit a student to switch view mode and use the map to memorize/study that specific topic, and selectively in view mode double tapping on a note play the associated voice note or read aloud a written text associated to the node;

or

optionally include the combination of map, color, shapes, words and associated audio to learn;

map creation to start from an ebook program;

when a student highlights a word or sentence to memorize for further use in mapping, and a link the selected word to one of the categories;

selectively being the Main topic/concept;

When;

Where;

How;

Who;

or Why.