SHARE-IT: School-Home Research Environment through Intelligent Technologies

自闭症谱系疾病(ASCs)是一种神经发育疾病，在全球范围内影响着越来越多的人，在英国每100个孩子中就有一个受到影响。患有自闭症的儿童在社会互动和沟通技能以及执行需要发起和回应社会行动的任务方面存在明显困难，如模仿、轮流和合作(联合)行动。许多患有ASCs的儿童继续经历终身失业，往往还会出现严重的精神健康问题。目前还没有治愈ASCs的方法。然而，早期干预和持续不断的支持对于提高儿童应对社会状况的能力，以及提高儿童及其照顾者的生活质量和前景至关重要。自闭症最佳做法社区和许多为自闭症学生提供专门服务的学校倡导向校内外儿童提供一致和可持续的支持。现代干预措施强调在不同背景下提供一致的支持，并让教师和家长通过共同创造学习经验来分享每个孩子的目标管理。越来越多的教师和家长将技术视为一种有效的补充干预措施，由于移动和云计算的负担能力和效率不断提高，它可能会为家庭和学校对儿童的支持之间持续和可持续的联系提供基本的基础设施。最近，自闭症的TEI有了巨大的增长，但就像以前的教学创新一样，设计和研究是按顺序发展的，对实践几乎没有直接影响，在现实世界的课堂上进行的研究也很有限。日益成熟的移动和云计算使在学校和家庭建立和提供干预的开放系统成为可能。鉴于自闭症最佳实践社区对这样一个开放平台的呼吁，他们也使其成为必要的、相关的和及时的。机器学习和凝视跟踪等人工智能技术越来越多地嵌入日常技术中，可以将这种开放平台从交流思想和经验的地方转变为可以动态共同创造的地方。Share-IT的目标是系统地研究如何将不同的个人和移动设备单独和一起使用，为患有自闭症谱系障碍(ASCs)的儿童创造一个可扩展的智能学习环境。总体目标是促进在学校、家庭和其他相关背景下对儿童的持续支持。Share-IT有两个研究问题：(Q1)：通过使用技术来连接学校、家庭和儿童现有的治疗制度，能否优化自闭症干预的效果？(Q2)：如何通过(I)教师和家长持续的自愿投入和(Ii)应用人工智能(AI)技术来实时跟踪和记录儿童在自然环境中的行为，这种技术基础设施如何能够长期保持下去？Share-IT的潜在影响是重大的，因为它的发现以及研究过程本身可以在许多情况下影响许多人：教师如何向学校的儿童提供支持；家长如何以符合学校干预的方式在家中帮助孩子，以及如何应对照顾患有自闭症儿童的重大需求；向儿童提供量身定制的按需支持。在EPSRC下进行野外研究对于实现Share-IT的雄心壮志至关重要，因为这一机制既满足了所需的工程工作，也满足了利益相关者在创造与他们相关和有用的技术的过程中的关键参与。

Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASCs) are neurodevelopmental conditions that affect an increasing number of individuals globally, and 1 child in 100 in the UK. Children with ASCs have marked difficulties in social interaction and communication skills and in performing tasks that require initiation of and responding to social actions, such as imitation, turn-taking and collaborative (joint) actions. Many children with ASCs go on to experience a life-time of unemployment and often severe mental health difficulties. There is no cure for ASCs. However, early intervention and consistent support that is also sustained over time and contexts is paramount to improving the child's ability to cope with social situations and, to enhancing their and their caregivers' quality of life, and outlook. Provision of consistent and sustainable support for children in and outside of school is advocated by the autism best practice community and by many schools with specialist provisions for ASC pupils. Modern interventions emphasise consistent support across contexts, and for teachers and parents to share the management of goals for each child through co-creation of learning experiences. Increasingly, teachers and parents look to technology as an effective complimentary intervention that, thanks to growing affordability and efficacy of mobile and cloud computing may provide the basic infrastructure for a continuous and sustainable link between the support given to children at home and at school.Recently there has been a massive growth in TEIs for Autism, but as with previous teaching-learning innovations, design and research have evolved in a sequential manner, with little direct influence on practice and limited research having been conducted in real-world classrooms. Maturing mobile and cloud computing make an open system for intervention creation and delivery in school and at home viable. Given the calls from the autism best practice community for such an open platform, they make it also necessary, relevant and timely. Artificial Intelligence techniques such as machine learning and gaze-tracking, which are increasingly embedded in everyday technologies, can transform such open platforms from places where ideas and experiences are exchanged, to places that can be co-created dynamically. The objective of SHARE-IT is to systematically investigate how different personal and mobile devices can be used individually and together to create a scalable intelligent learning environment for children with Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASCs). The overarching aim is to facilitate continuity of support for children across school, home and other relevant contexts. SHARE-IT has two research questions: (Q1): Can the efficacy of autism interventions be optimized by using technology to interface across school, home and the child's existing therapeutic regime?; (Q2): How can such technological infrastructure be sustained over time through a combination of (i) continuous, voluntary input from teachers and parents and (ii) the application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques to the real-time tracking and logging of children's behaviours in naturalistic environments?The potential impact of SHARE-IT is significant as its findings, along with the research process itself, can affect many people in many contexts: teachers in how they deliver support to children at school; parents in how they help their children at home in a way that is consistent with school intervention and in how they cope with the significant demands of caring for a child with an ASC; children in being offered a tailored and on-demand support. Undertaking research in the wild under the EPSRC is crucial to achieving SHARE-IT's ambitions because this mechanism caters for both the engineering effort required and the crucial involvement of stakeholders in the process of creating technology that is relevant and useful to them.