Australian researchers use RFID to track activity levels of preschoolers
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Karen Tonch, a researcher at UOW’s Early Start Institute, is using an RFID-based solution to track the movement and distance of students and educators around the kindergarten playground, providing insight into how much teacher involvement affects children’s activity levels . This research will aim to provide educators and other stakeholders with information on how teachers can influence children’s levels of activity during their early years of education. The premise is that the more physical activity a child is, the better the individual’s health and well-being becomes.
To track the location and movement of students and teachers, Tonch uses battery-operated RFID tags and stationary readers from Fusion Systems Ltd. (CSL). Students and teachers wear autographed, battery-powered devices that contain accelerometers that measure the amount and intensity of a person’s movements. It then determines where and with whom a person is by manually comparing the collected movement data with RFID-based location data. Currently, however, Tonch said she and other researchers are developing a software program that integrates autographed accelerometer data and RFID real-time location system (RTLS) data to create an automatic correlation between location and exercise intensity.
In each participating school, Tonch installed several CSL RTLS RFID fixed readers that plug into the power supply separately.
To get his Ph.D. in education, Tang Qi is working with the Early Start Institute. After discussing her research project with ESRI research lead Tony Okley, who is familiar with CSL RFID technology, Tonch began a three-year study in early 2014. Simply observing a child’s activity wouldn’t provide the activity data details needed for research, she explained, so she started a project using RFID wristbands and readers.
At the end of the project, it will involve 600 pre-school children (ages 2–5) in 15 kindergartens in NSW, and up to 100 educators who work with those children. To date, Tonch has installed technology at six kindergartens in the Wollongong area for about a week at each site.
Tonch chose to conduct the study only during outdoor playtime, when children are expected to be most active.
Each participant, adult or child, wore an autographed wGT3X-BT device strapped to his or her waist to track exercise intensity and a CS3151BBCD RFID-tagged wristband on the hand. Tonchi installed CSL RTLS RFID fixed readers that were plugged into the power supply separately. Another reader transmits location data to a CSL RTLS RFID gateway reader, which connects to a laptop running CSL software (which calculates each person’s location).
Tonch arranged the readers in such a way that as the tags moved across the playground, the software triangulates them using the data provided by the readers. That means she sometimes has to be creative when it comes to installing these devices. “They can be in a shopping bag,” Tonch states, “hanging from a tree,” for example, or mounted on a fence, wall, or shelf. She installs at least four readers, but sometimes as many as eight, depending on the size and shape of the playground. “Some (playgrounds) are a cute rectangle, but others are L-shaped or more awkward, in which case I use up to 8 readers.
A preschooler in a project, wearing a CSL RFID tag on his wrist and a battery-powered activity monitor with a personal signature on his waist
Once Tonch has the reader installed, she registers each device’s GPS coordinates into the CSL software to display a map of the playground. The reader itself creates a wireless mesh network that transmits data to the gateway reader. The CSL software running on the laptop used triangulation to track the movement of each tag. Tonch then enters data that can be overlaid on the map, such as the location of sandpits, picnic tables or playground equipment. “I wanted to be able to see different properties in each environment,” she explained, in order to determine how those properties could affect activity.
Each RFID tag uses a proprietary air interface protocol to transmit a 2.4GHz signal encoded with a unique ID number. The ID number is associated with the student or teacher wearing the tag, although the identity of the individual is not tracked. When a tag-wearing adult or child is on the playground where the reader is deployed, the CSL software recognizes the position of each wristband in real time and displays an icon as the tag-wearing person moves around the playground (E for educator, C children).
As teachers and students move across the playground, the CSL software not only captures real-time movement data, but also stores the information for analysis. Tonch said she can see details like how often educators are in close contact with children, how active children are in front of teachers, and when a particular student (based on an anonymous ID number) will get more or less contact with the educator while playing. less time together.
“I can also watch the movement when they’re actually happening,” Tonch added, recalling the day the garbage truck came to check out the extent of the nursery playground. When the truck arrived, she said, “I could see all the little dots going to the fence and going along the fence” as the vehicles passed.
The study, which will end in 2017, has already produced quite a bit of data, Tonch said, though she hasn’t yet analyzed many of the results. “The information we get from services (kindergartens) is so different,” she said. For example, some schools have more educators per number of children, some have different routines and programs, and some have higher activity levels among children and educators.
For students, selling RFID wristbands is easy, Tonch said. “The kids love them. An observing lady told me,” she added, and the kids were eager to put the device on their wrists. The labels have to be durable, she noted, because they are given to small children. For example, they were buried in sand, as well as covered in paint and clay, but as far as Tonch is known, they still work well in this situation.
Technology itself has a lot of potential for schools, Tonch said, because it can track student and teacher behavior with rigor that would be impossible to do manually.
Tonch describes the goals of her research project this way: “I hope to contribute to my field, and hopefully influence, by compiling statistics on the role of educators in engaging children and the resulting activity levels. strategy and practice.”
“By 2017, I’ll have a very clear picture of how educators influence children’s activity levels,” added Tonch. She plans to make the results of her work available to researchers, teachers and other education sectors, using In organizing preschool programs, preschool activities, environments, teacher training and “student-to-teacher” structures.
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