Children interacting with high-tech tables at libraries

In the Children's Room at the Iowa City Public Library, an interactive touchpad resembling a table-sized iPad offers children a new way to interact with technology.

Library Director Susan Craig hopes this particular piece of technology will give children experience working together.

'At a young age, playing is learning,” said Craig. 'So you can have activities on (the table) that many people would call games, but is it about counting and figuring out how to do something. It's just fun.”

The Cedar Rapids Public Library also has a similar table.

'The public loves it,” said Amber Mussman, the Cedar Rapids Public Library's community relations manager. 'We find kids are instantly drawn to it, and it is fun to see them play games together.”

According to Information Technology Coordinator Brent Palmer, the table at the Iowa City Library was planned for renovations the library did last year.

The $15,000 Ideum PLATFORM 55 boasts a 55-inch touch screen with about 40 touch points. The average tablet or smartphone has about 11.

'Most people have a small tablet. You can't really play together on a small device,” Palmer said. '(We) want to encourage kids to play together instead of just by themselves.”

However, few existing apps or games are both multi-player and multi-touch. According to Palmer, most software available for these kinds of tables is used in museums.

To compensate for lack of software, the library partnered with local programmers. One group, Virtually Competent, created a game called Shipshape, where players work together to fire into a target.

'Shipshape was designed as a cooperative game in order to bolster social skills in the children who play it,” said Eric Neuhaus, founder of Virtually Competent. 'We hope to contribute to the old way of playing that brings people much closer than playing online usually does.”

Neuhaus plans on keeping Shipshape in active development and using the children's feedback for future updates.

The library also is working with EPX - pronounced 'epics” - a student organization at the University of Iowa. The university does not have a game design curriculum, so designing games for the library helps EPX gain exposure and experience elsewhere in the community. The organization's current project, Pizza Box, involves building robots to deliver pizza to virtual customers.

'The exciting thing about new technology is that there (are) so many possibilities,” said EPX president and game designer, Ryan Holtkamp.

According to Holtkamp, one of the biggest challenges is designing games that children can just walk up to and start playing without instruction.

Virtually Competent and EPX design gameplay with simplicity in mind. However, the real benefit of the device, according to Craig, 'is to give access to technology to people who may not be able to afford it.”

Neuhaus agrees and said the table will benefit children in other ways. 'I don't know what kind of applications this kind of technology will have in the future,” he said. 'But smaller touch devices are everywhere and the skills they learn from experimenting with the table will certainly give them a leg up when they get older.”