Intangible cultural heritage (ICH) is a relatively recent term coined to represent living cultural expressions and practices, which are recognised by communities as distinct aspects of identity. The safeguarding of ICH has become a topic of international concern primarily through the work of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). However, little research has been done on the role of new technologies in the preservation and transmission of intangible heritage. This chapter examines resources, projects and technologies providing access to ICH and identifies gaps and constraints. It draws on research conducted within the scope of the collaborative research project, i-Treasures. In doing so, it covers the state of the art in technologies that could be employed for access, capture and analysis of ICH in order to highlight how specific new technologies can contribute to the transmission and safeguarding of ICH.

While a lot of papers have argued for the educational potential of serious games, the field is still young and methods and tools are needed in order to support effective and efficient design. The SG Studies Database is an instrument devised to allow sharing structured information about SGs. This information can be used by scholars and practitioners also to perform comparative analysis and identify components and modules that could be used in different games. The SG Studies database, which is freely available online on the site of the Serious Games Society, relies on a SG description model, that has been defined in order to allow a structured description of SGs, considering the perspectives of different stakeholders and contexts of use, and spurring the identification of SG components and their relationship with pedagogical theories and expected outcomes. The SG Studies database has already been used as a tool to support identification of reusable patterns and components in SGs, in order to identify best practices and favor module re-use. Other meta studies are possible in the future on the database by any parties.

This paper offers some thoughts on the use of educational digital logic games. Specifically refers to a number of research experiments conducted by ITD-CNR, which have highlighted the significant potential of digital games to help develop and/or consolidation of logical thinking and reasoning skills in students of primary and secondary school level. It offers a brief overview of four research experiences carried out by multidisciplinary teams coordinated by ITD-CNR since the early 2000s These experiences have highlighted the high potential of digital games to develop and strengthen logical thinking skills and have shown the positive impact of their use even on school performance. Verificare e stimolare le abilità di ragionamento con i giochi digitali Questo contributo propone alcune riflessioni sull’uso educativo dei giochi logici digitali. In particolare fa riferimento ad alcune esperienze di ricerca condotte dall’Istituto di Tecnologie Didattiche - Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (ITD-CNR) che hanno evidenziato le interessanti potenzialità dei giochi digitali per contribuire allo sviluppo e/o al consolidamento del pensiero logico e delle abilità di ragionamento in studenti di scuola primaria e secondaria di primo grado. Si propone un breve excursus su quattro esperienze di ricerca svolte da equipe multidisciplinari coordinate da ITD-CNR a partire dai primi anni Duemila. Tali esperienze hanno messo in luce l’alto potenziale dei giochi digitali per sviluppare e potenziare abilità di pensiero logico ed hanno evidenziato il positivo impatto del loro uso anche sul rendimento scolastico.

The issue of protection and promotion of cultural heritage has become a central topic of European and international cultural policy, especially in recent decades. Beside more ‘tangible’ cultural manifestations (like archaeological sites, natural parks or museum collections) there is a huge heritage, made up of intangible live expressions like performing arts, social practices, oral traditions, etc. which is threatened by the globalization process. The i-Treasures project looks at some of these intangible cultural expressions with the aim not only of preserving them, but also of providing innovative solutions to education in this field. In order to do this, the project explores the potential of cutting edge technologies for capturing the specificities of the considered Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) expressions, analyzing and modeling data and making these resources available for preservation, research and educational purposes. With this aim an open and extendable platform is developed in the project framework. This paper deals with the process of user and system requirements definition and explains how this was necessarily influenced by the specificities of the ICH expressions considered. This process encompassed the identification of the specificities of rare traditional know-how, the discovery of the existing teaching and learning practices and finally the identification of the most cutting edge technologies able to support innovative teaching and learning approaches to ICH.

There is not a unique definition of “empowerment”, nevertheless the idea that it involves, on the one hand, people having control over their own lives and, on the other, some social aspects seems to be a common characteristic. Most authors recognize three levels of empowerment: individual, group, and community level, which are interconnected and changes at one level influence the others. Enhancing individual competence and self-esteem has a direct effect on the control of one’s own life and, in turn, on the social components of empowerment. In this paper we present Smart Angel, a project that aims at creating a network involving families, caregivers, experts, and tutors, as well as the final users and their friends, based on a mobile cloud system in support of both everyday living and urban mobility for people with medium-mild intellectual disabilities, with particular attention to the Down syndrome. The system can be seen as a tool to empower its users to be more independent and therefore increasing their possibility to have an active role in their life and an active participation to the community.

The paper deals with the adoption of Serious Games (SGs) in the specific area of Intangible Cultural Heritage Education (ICH). The transmission of some cultural expressions, like rare traditional singing or dancing, is more related to the acquisition of procedural knowledge (i.e. how to perform some tasks, like a dance step) rather than to declarative knowledge (i.e. knowledge that can be declared or stated through words or symbol systems, e.g. music notation). Coherently, so far knowledge in these areas has been transmitted mainly by observation or imitation of experts/performers in real contexts. Grounded on the research results in Game Based Learning and on the opportunity offered by cutting-edge sensor technologies, the i-Treasures project exploits the interesting potential of Serious Games in the ICH field. As a matter of fact, the capacity of games to train motor skills and to support sensorimotor learning, together with their ability to enhance engagement and motivation, are the main elements at the heart of our choice. In the paper, we discuss in depth the theoretical rationale behind the adoption of Serious Games i-Treasures, also in the light of their current use in Cultural Heritage Education. Furthermore, the paper describes the main game design principles adopted by the i-Treasures project to address the specificities of various artistic expressions and to make the games sound and effective tools to support practice and learning.

The paper discusses how to design innovative educational interventions in the field of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH). This field is peculiar, as it is characterized by the urgency to preserve and disseminate some of the most peculiar intangible artistic expressions, especially those at risk of disappearing; so far these cultural expressions have been passed down mainly through imitation and oral tradition, so now technologies can play a role in fostering their preservation and documentation. Drawing on the discussion held in recent years in the field of Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL), the paper describes a web-based tool aimed to support the collaborative design and planning of innovative ICT-based learning/teaching activities in ICH education. While providing an overview of the main functionalities of such a tool, the paper solicits some reflections on how TEL approaches, techniques and tools can fruitfully be employed to sustain ICH education. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Continuing interest in digital games indicated that it would be useful to update Connolly et al.'s (2012) systematic literature review of empirical evidence about the positive impacts and outcomes of games. Since a large number of papers was identified in the period from 2009 to 2014, the current review focused on 143 papers that provided higher quality evidence about the positive outcomes of games. Connolly et al.'s multidimensional analysis of games and their outcomes provided a useful framework for organising the varied research in this area. The most frequently occurring outcome reported for games for learning was knowledge acquisition, while entertainment games addressed a broader range of affective, behaviour change, perceptual and cognitive and physiological outcomes. Games for learning were found across varied topics with STEM subjects and health the most popular. Future research on digital games would benefit from a systematic programme of experimental work, examining in detail which game features are most effective in promoting engagement and supporting learning.

Intellectual disabilities are one of the main causes due to which people can seldom reach a completely independent living. Down syndrome is the world's most common chromosomal disorder and cause of intellectual disability. Cognitive development is usually delayed and learning difficulties persist throughout life. Typically, individuals with Down syndrome tend to have difficulty in abstraction, generalization and, in particular, with short-term memory. They often seem to forget learned skills from one day to the next, as previous learning is often not transferred to future experiences. This is a problem in every learning context, including mobility. Nevertheless, a large number of people with the Down syndrome can reach a good level of independence; many have a job and can move by themselves along known paths in town. These skills are traditionally learnt through a long training performed by expert educators in a face-to-face situation.Within the Smart Angel project, a system based on cloud computing technologies and geolocation systems ( both satellite and terrestrial) has been developed. The target users find in their Smart Phones a guardian angel that quietly supports them in their everyday life and is always ready to help in case of need. They can move freely around town knowing that, if needed, help can be asked at any time. Furthermore, the system supports specific activities where the users typically have difficulty as, for example, time management.The Smart Angel system offers the users the possibility to learn the new paths in town by actually moving along them, avoiding the use of maps, which require a certain amount of abstraction. Furthermore, it offers the possibility to implement an instructional scaffolding approach: constant support is offered during the learning process, which is tailored to the needs of the user, with the intention of helping him/her achieve his/her learning goals. Researches have demonstrated that scaffolding helps learners with Down syndrome in their learning process by easing the burden of the short-term memory.Educators and families are often overprotective and underestimate the possessed abilities. Smart Angel, by tracking the users' movements and showing them in real time to the educators in charge, allows more freedom and discoveries without leaving the individuals completely alone. They can therefore experiment the newly learnt skills and further develop them by moving autonomously and discovering new areas in town. Should unforeseen situations arise, they will be managed by the users with the immediate assistance of his educator.The Cloud Based system stores all the users' data allowing the educators both real time monitoring on the maps and an offline historical analysis of the users' data to have information about their movements, the areas covered, and their behaviours: how much did they actually use the system, how often did they ask for help, etc. This gives the educators a better and more complete understanding of the real level of ability reached by the users allowing them to decide how much support is needed by the single learner. As the users' abilities grow, the educators gradually step back as the user gets more and more independent.

A cloud-mobile platform under development in the framework of the SMART ANGEL project co-financed by the Italian Liguria Region is presented . The platform is meant to address the needs of people with intellectual disabilities; it is oriented to support and enhance their autonomy and in particular their mobility in urban environments, and can be regarded as an innovative assistive technology. The platform is a concrete instance of how cutting-edge ICT technologies can act as assistive technologies to empower e-inclusion. The potential benefits for the final users (subjects with the Down syndrome and/or similar intellectual disabilities) are outlined as well as those for health professionals and care givers in charge of their assistance.

In the last years the protection and safeguarding of cultural heritage has become a key issue of European cultural policy and this applies not only to tangible artefacts (monuments, sites, etc.), but also to intangible cultural expressions (singing, dancing, etc.). The i-Treasures project focuses on some Intangible Cultural Heritages (ICH) and investigates whether and to what extent new technology can play a role in the preservation and dissemination of these expressions. To this aim, the project will develop a system, based on cutting edge technology and sensors, that digitally captures the performances of living human treasures, analyses the digital information to semantically index the performances and their constituting elements, and builds an educational platform on top of the semantically indexed content. The main purpose of this paper is to describe how the user requirements of this system were defined. The requirements definition process was based on a participatory approach, where ICH experts, performers and users were actively involved through surveys and interviews, and extensively collaborated in the complex tasks of identifying specificities of rare traditional know-how, discovering existing teaching and learning practices and finally identifying the most cutting edge technologies able to support innovative teaching and learning approaches to ICH.

The paper draws on the i-Treasures EU project which adopts cutting-edge sensors and ICT technologies to sustain Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) learning and transmission. It highlights how some of the main educational challenges that are characteristic of this peculiar field have been addressed in the project by relying on consolidated Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) practices and related tools. In particular, it focuses on pedagogical planning as a means to sustain the design, deployment and sharing of educational interventions, which are suitable and effective from the viewpoint of contents, structure and learning /teaching methodologies.

Since the first time the term “Virtual Reality” (VR) has been used back in the 60s, VR has evolved in different manners becoming more and more similar to the real world. Two different kinds of VR can be identified: non-immersive and immersive. The former is a computer-based environment that can simulate places in the real or imagined worlds; the latter takes the idea even further by giving the perception of being physically present in the non-physical world. While non-immersive VR can be based on a standard computer, immersive VR is still evolving as the needed devices are becoming more user friendly and economically accessible. In the past, there was a major difficulty about using equipment such as a helmet with goggles, while now new devices are being developed to make usability better for the user. VR, which is based on three basic principles: Immersion, Interaction, and User involvement with the environment and narrative, offers a very high potential in education by making learning more motivating and engaging. Up to now, the use of immersive-VR in educational games has been limited due to high prices of the devices and their limited usability. Now new tools like the commercial “Oculus Rift”, make it possible to access immersive-VR in lots of educational situations. This paper reports a survey on the scientific literature on the advantages and potentials in the use of Immersive Virtual Reality in Education in the last two years (2013-2014). It shows how VR in general, and immersive VR in particular, has been used mostly for adult training in special situations or for university students. It then focuses on the possible advantages and drawbacks of its use in education with reference to different classes of users like children and some kinds of cognitive disabilities (with particular reference to the Down syndrome). It concludes outlining strategies that could be carried out to verify these ideas.

This paper tackles the issue of Serious Games design by drawing on the experience conducted in the framework of the i-Treasures project, which deals with the preservation and transmission of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH). In i-Treasures a collection of Serious Games has been developed addressing four relevant ICH areas: singing, dancing, craftsmanship and music composition. So far one game for each of the four areas has been developed; the ultimate aim of the games is making learning and transmission of specific ICH expressions (namely Tsamiko dance, human beat box, pottery, contemporary music composition) more motivating, engaging and, ultimately, effective. Starting from the concept of pedagogy-driven game design, the main pedagogical choices adopted are outlined. Further considerations on the overall design process are also proposed by focusing, in particular, on the need for engaging in a collaborative work a variety of professionals (in the case partners of the project) with different expertise, skills and background. Short intro: Games are increasingly adopted to favour learning in a variety of different educational areas. This paper deals with their adoption in the area of Cultural Heritage Education, in particular in the field of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH). Actually, it focuses on the design of Serious Games (SGs) for supporting and enhancing learning and transmission of practical skills, such as those required to perform specific ICH expressions (e.g.: dances, handicraft). In this area, the potential of SGs is relevant because the learning opportunities they offer are "situated", that is the learner acts in a virtual context which closely resembles the one where the cultural expression is usually practiced. Nevertheless, the SGs' educational potential and actual effectiveness may vary appreciably as a consequence of the design choices made a priori before starting the implementation.

The main objective of the EU FP7 ICT i-Treasures project is to build a public and expandable platform to enable learning and transmission of rare know-how of intangible cultural heritage. A core part of this platform consists of game-like applications able to support teaching and learning processes in the ICH field. We have designed and developed four game-like applications (for Human Beat Box singing, Tsamiko dancing, pottery making and contemporary music composition), each corresponding to one of the ICH use cases of i-Treasures project. A first preliminary version of these applications is currently available for further validation, evaluation and demonstration within the project. We have encountered a number of issues, most of which derive from the peculiarities of the ICH domains addressed by the project, and many have already been resolved/ The evaluation results are expected to lead to further optimization of these

The concept of Serious Gaming refers to the adoption of classical entertainment games for purposes other than entertainment, including learning and instruction. In this paper the authors report on a Serious Gaming field experiment where typical board games (such as battleship, master mind and domino) were employed with the shifted purpose of triggering and sustaining primary school students' reasoning and logical abilities. The results of the field experiment showed that: 1) there is a strong correlation between school achievement and the ability to play and solve this kind of games and that 2) motivation and engagement in game-based learning tasks is very high, irrespective of the level of achievement of the subjects. Final considerations are drawn about the potential and the opportunity of adopting the considered games to support those reasoning skills that are widely recognized as transversal to any kind of learning and thus deeply affecting overall school performance.

The paper presents an interactive game-like application to learn, perform and evaluate modern contemporary singing. The Human Beat Box (HBB) is being used as a case study. The game consists of two main modules. A sensor module that consists of a portable helmet based system containing an ultrasonic (US) transducer to capture tongue movements, a video camera for the lips, Kinect camera for face gestures, and a microphone for sound. A 3D environment game module is used to visualize a 3D recording studio as game world with all of its unique elements like guitars, mixer, amplifier, speakers and a microphone in front of the 3D avatar to simulate the recording ambience. The game also features a 2D virtual tutor to help the learner by giving oral and written feedback during the game. He also gives feedbacks during the practice session to improve the student’s performance. The game is still at its early stages of development and it is been tested using simple HBB plosive sounds for percussion such as “PTK”.

The paper deals with the hot issue of entrepreneurship education and describes the rationale behind the gamified and collaborative courses for university students conceived, developed and deployed in the framework of the eSG (stimulating entrepreneurship through Serious Games) project, funded under the EU lifelong learning (LLP) Programme. The project aims to help students becoming familiar, mainly through practice, with basic concepts of entrepreneurship and company management and to stimulate the emergence of their entrepreneurial attitudes. In the framework of the project specific courses mainly grounded on the concepts of gamification and collaboration were designed and carried out in three different partner countries: Italy, Spain and the Netherlands. The main objectives of the courses are presented in this paper and a theoretical model supporting the choice of Serious Games is shown which keeps into account usability, pedagogy and the entrepreneurship skills expressed by state of the art models.

In recent times in most EU countries educational policies encourage schools to sustain and promote awareness of local cultures and heritage; as a consequence, spreading knowledge about local traditions is becoming a target also for educators, who need suitable tools and pedagogies, as well as appropriate sources of information. This paper refers to those cultural expressions that are defined by UNESCO as ICH (Intangible Cultural Heritage) and argues that ICT-based tools can contribute to their diffusion and to the “passing down” to the new generations of the rare knowhow behind them. After briefly dealing with the concept of ICH and its value within local communities, the paper refers, as an example, to Cantu a Tenore, a typical singing expression from Sardinia-Italy which is listed in the “Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity”. The Cantu a Tenore is a cultural practice that is not yet well known outside Sardinia and so far its transmission has been mainly based on practicing together with peers, looking at and listening to master singers. Corrently, Net –Technologies can play a major role in supporting the diffusion of information regarding the Cantu a Tenore and also its “learning” and “transmission”. This feeling is also widespread among the “living human treasures” themselves, namely in those humans who are the depositary of this peculiar and relevant cultural heritage. As a matter of fact, on the one hand a huge amount of information and data (historical, geographical, technical, etc.) are accessible on the web and, on the other, web 2.0 tools can effectively contribute to spreading the rare knowhow behind Cantu a Tenore beyond the local communities, to reach learners, general public and researchers. In addition, cutting edge ICT tools can well serve the scope of contributing to the transmission of specific skills to apprentices; the educational platform developed in the framework of the i-Treasures project (an Integrated Project co-financed under the 7th Framework Programme) is an outstanding example of how to exploit the potential of tools and technologies to this end.

The paper presents a case study in ICT-enhanced entrepreneurship education. It draws on the Entrepreneurship through Serious Games (eSG) EU project, co-funded by EACEA in the framework of the lifelong learning programme (LLP) in 2011. The collaborative project was carried out in three EU countries (Italy, Spain and the Netherlands), where three different courses in Entrepreneurship for higher education students were designed, delivered and evaluated. This paper focuses on the Italian experience and devotes specific attention to the two courses (one for each of the two years of the project) carried out at the University of Genoa (UNIGE), involving students of non-business faculties (engineering). The two courses were based on a blended-learning model, used gamification techniques and adopted innovative ICT tools, such as Serious Games (SGs). In the paper, the learning/teaching methodology adopted in the Italian courses is described and the overall potential of the blended strategy is highlighted. Actually, following Pankin et al. (2012) the two courses can correctly be classified as blended, as they adopted a learning/teaching strategy based on: different learning or instructional methods (lecture, discussion, guided practice, reading, games, case study, simulation), different delivery methods (live classroom or computer mediated), different scheduling (synchronous or asynchronous) and different levels of guidance (individual, instructor or expert led, or group/social learning) (Pankin, Roberts, and July, 2012). As a matter of fact, one of the key elements of the two UNIGE courses was the integration of gaming sessions with both theoretical lectures and talks with entrepreneurs and experts in the field; in addition some parts of the courses required attendance of classroom lectures while other parts only required online presence and related activities. Different levels of guidance were also experienced by participants during the courses: they were invited to work both individually and in groups and the learning process was both guided (by teachers, experts in the field and real entrepreneurs) and self-regulated. As to the tools adopted in the project, the experimental courses showed that Serious Games represent a suitable tool for sustaining Entrepreneurship Education. Besides, the appropriateness and effectiveness of the use of Serious Games for the intended purposes, the experiments conducted also demonstrated the suitability of the adopted blended learning/teaching methodology for sustaining student motivation and ultimately for improving learning.