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My name is David Denholm and I am 38 years old. I live in Perth Western Australia. I have a daughter who is 16 months old.
In my spare time I try and play some video games, also do some minor add-ons for an online game.
I have been into gaming and various tech since I was about 8 and my dad bought a Nintendo Entertainment System home. At various points of my childhood, I would disassemble various items, (Radios and pcs etc) and learn how they work before reassembling them.
I left school after year 10 because I was bored. I took up cabinetmaking and moved towards some hands-on work. I started learning some LUA through and forum and started making some basic add-ons for a game.
My grandma was an artist, I did not consider myself one until I started my hand at software development. This was my form of art. I am looking to advance my knowledge and skills in this area.
I started studying with RMIT to enhance my programing skills and learn some more in regards to IT. I would like to develop some apps or games one day.
My Ideal job would be tech support and game developer. I have been into tech and gaming since I was a child, and this would allow me to continue this interest.
As I have a daughter working on apps and games from home would allow me to work during school hours and still maintain a good relationship with my daughter. I have always been good at troubleshooting issues, so tech support and bug finding comes natural to me.
The Defender personality type is quite unique, as many of their qualities defy the definition of their individual traits. Though sensitive, Defenders have excellent analytical abilities; though reserved, they have well-developed people skills and robust social relationships; and though they are generally a conservative type, Defenders are often receptive to change and new ideas.
As with so many things, people with the Defender personality type are more than the sum of their parts, and it is the way they use these strengths that defines who they are.
Defender personality type can always be relied on for their kindness and ability to listen to concerns, and to find ways to resolve them. Win-win situations are Defenders’ bread and butter, and no one takes quite the same pleasure in finding satisfying resolutions to day-to-day challenges.
As conflict is inevitable these traits are strong attributes to have to help resolve conflict.
I have always considered myself a hands-on learner. My result, "Pragmatist" confirmed this as I like to experiment and try out new ideas for myself.
I have always considered myself as a little nerdy. My result agrees. I scored 57 out of 70. While I am a bit nerdy, I am not a total nerd. (Yet)
My concept is to design and build an interactive learning toy/tool for my daughter to educate her in a way that is engaging and motivational. While there are several apps for this already, this would not necessarily be an app, but a device that would encourage and reward the user to keep trying and better themselves through usage. This device could be a tablet for children that would allow other apps to be used once the required daily learning was achieved.
As I have recently had a daughter, my focus has been to raise her as a strong, independent young lady. Providing her with some good educational toys will help me educate her without her feeling like learning is a chore. She is naturally inquisitive and likes to experiment with objects and see how the world works, so creating a device that allows her to interact with it will help her to stay engaged.
Children who are often glued to mobile devices may benefit from a tablet style device. A tablet that encourages learning through apps with a time-based or result-based reward system (Set by the parent) would mean children learn and study daily to allow access to the media and game content on the device. The time-based setting would encourage usage even if the child did not receive full marks in a subject for that day. This would encourage effort to keep trying. The result-based setting would require a certain result in each subject prior to unlocking the media options. This would mean the child would need to practice more each day to get better results.
The device would then need to be developed for children and include other subjects and increase the number of games and educational tools supported. Software locking for the device would need to be parent controlled and viewing restrictions would need to be hardcoded into the childs device.
The product would need to be cost effective for manufacture and development as well as for the parents. Creating a product that no one can afford would require government aid or support to make the project viable. While this a possibility, moving forward with hopes of this is not feasible.
The device would require onboard memory with a possible memory expansion for the growing memory requirements. An update method would be required, this could be wifi/cloud-based download or plug and play into a pc for updates.
The programming language would be C++ as I intend to learn that language in the future. The device would likely be android based as Apple development has a lot more limitations.
The device would need to be large enough for child interaction, a tablet sized device would be more suitable than a small phone sized device.
The educational aspects of the learning would require potentially a team of child education experts to develop the different aspects of the app. It is unlikely a team of software engineers would be child education experts.
Server costs would be minimal as it would only be used for updating the device software. The software language would need to be determined later as the best language for such a device is currently unknown. This may involve some durable materials for the body construction as kids will be kids.
Costs would be the primary obstacle. Ideally, we would get a government grant of aid, however we can't rely on that.
Experience will be the main limiting factor with the project. I currently have no experience with creating and writing code of this level or designing devices of this standard.
This will mean I either need funding for development or find others who want to participate in a project of this type, who have experience in the relevant fields to help design and create the project.
Once the Project has been developed it would ideally be marketed for sale and use with schools and other educational programs.
The end goal would be to have the devices used by children in homes around the world. This would help parents ensure that even though they have busy lives, they can still have educational influence on their children at home.