• Overview
• Screenshots
• Projects

Overview

In a society where concepts of family, community and "what is right and wrong" are constantly changing, there is a need for environments that encourage children and adolescents to actively explore the social and personal values they live by.

The Kaleidostories research project uses the creation of personal narratives in the context of an on-line virtual community to explore how web-based collaborative environments can become "tools to think with" about issues of identity.

* Kaleidostories* /[Greek kalos (beautiful) + eidos (form) + stories] / is a computational platform that allows researchers and educators to create their own narrative-based virtual communities.

Screenshots

Kaleidostories program interface

Projects

Kaleidostories has been used by Prof. Bers in two pilot experiences in which middle and high school students and their teachers, in five different Spanish/English sites around the world, created a virtual community to exchange stories about shared values and role models. The goal of this research project was to explore how new technologies can assist young people to discover their own selves as well as the underlying patterns of thought and behavior that connect the worldviews proposed by different cultures. The project shows how teachers were able to use the on-line community to complement and augment their face to face activities and interactions by integrating Kaleidostories into different curricular content areas.

Tufts's doctoral student Dorothy Warner also used Kaleidostories as a support group component for adolescents with Insulin Dependent Diabetes Mellitus (IDDM). Kaleidostories served as an additional way to build a collaborative community in which individuals can explore issues that are important to them, such as goals and ways of reaching them.