In Your Classroom: "Eye Tracking"

by Jerone Mitchell     Department: In Your Classroom

The WIRED House segment offered a great look at what could be the future of living. Taken as a whole, the Living Homes are far outside the price range of most. However, we can look at certain components of the Living Home from the standpoint of what is available today.

One of the most instantly recognizable pieces of technology mentioned in the episode was the retina scanner used for security. Though we often see it in science fiction shows, the technology is available right now. Retinal scanners work by mapping out the unique patterns of the capillaries that supply blood to the retina, and storing it to a database. As a person comes back to the scanner, the two images are matched up to ensure identity. The retina is more unique than a fingerprint - even two identical twins do not have the same retina patterns - so the process is more secure than fingerprint scanning. Retinal scanning is an emerging technology that is used in a variety of applications; for example, the ValPak company uses retinal scanning as part of market research, to determine which areas of a potential advertisement attract a reader's attention as well as how interested the reader was. Here is an example video demonstrating eye tracking.

We can somewhat duplicate this experience in the classroom using Adobe Photoshop or Microsoft Paint. Take a picture of a person's eye (including the area around it) using a webcam and then change the size of the picture to stretch the pixels and enlarge them. On grid paper, color out the enlarge patterns using colored pencils to "save" the person's eye. Rescan again, and see if the students can match the newer shot to the "copies" on grid paper.

Another interesting piece of technology displayed in the segment was the digital home management system. Like retinal scan, having your entire home controlled by a single computer seems like an idea for the future, but there are several companies that specialize in this market. Companies of this type usually have model homes that are ideal for a field trip; Prodea Systems in Dallas, for example, offers field trips to see their products in action and talk about the future of digital home management. Of course, you may be in trouble if one such company is not in your area, but a simple Google search will allow you to find the closest such availability. Another alternative is to find online advertisements of these sorts of homes. For example, Amigo: The Intelligent Home Network has an example walkthrough of one of their homes online. 

Though it would be an unlikely teaching tool, the video game "The Sims" goes very far in terms of teaching what basic elements go into home building. Though the thrust of the game is in living a virtual life, one of the very first elements of the game involves building a house. From floor plan design to lighting to wallpapering to home security, the game gives an insight into dealing with multiple factors such as cost, size, and aesthetics to create something truly fit to live in. An example of this sort of simulated home-building can be found online.

Finally, it is always a good idea to tie everything together. Once all of these options have been presented to the students, they can put together the best of them as a "dream home". Determine a list of areas for students to focus on (security, entertainment, structure, etc.) and have the students find the real-life products that would best fit what they would want in a house. The students must be specific - makes, model/serial numbers, places to purchase the items, and price must all be listed. Imagination should be used for this endeavor as well, for example, there are people who have set up their Nintendo Wii entertainment system as their hub, and a video of this can be found at digital home management system.  In the end, the students can tally up the costs and determine the most expensive or most cost-efficient house. Students should use strictly resources from the classroom (i.e. Google, Wikipedia, and the like) to research what is available and to find out the costs. Another form of this project includes splitting the students into groups, assigning different cost-caps to each, and then determining who got the most for their money. A great starting point would include Smart Home, which is a one-stop shop for this digital home maintenance, timing and automation devices, cameras, etc.  Smart Home also has a walkthrough of a home with varying features available as video online.

Additional WIRED Science Video Segments
Don't forget to check out our Video Section for other segments from WIRED Science that you can use in your classroom.

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