Published papers

As the number of Internet users continues to increase, there is an urgent need to train Internet engineers to support this infrastructure. Our research team is designing and managing an educational program to foster Internet engineers for undergraduate students in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region. As part of the program, we are conducting on-site hands-on exercises to create a computer network with remote locations using Research and Education Networks (RENs). Since these onsite hands-on exercises will be conducted in various places in the APAC region, delays caused by physical distance are unavoidable. Therefore, our team has designed a low response time hands-on exercise environment to ensure comfortable student activities. Furthermore, to verify the effectiveness of this design, we conducted a simulation verification using a virtual environment. We confirmed that the design provides a low response time, even considering the unavoidable latency over distances in the APAC region.

This video introduces the diegetic prototypes from Interfuit, a design fiction film about near-future virtual funerals in Japan. These prototypes, including physical/virtual funeral venues, are fictional objects used in the story to show how people mourn, memorialize, and reconnect with the deceased in a society where virtual funerals are common. The film imagines a world where traditional funeral practices are freed from time and space limitations, with examples like attending funerals remotely or revisiting virtual venues years later. Our research through filmmaking highlights the potential for creative collaboration across fields to imagine alternative futures. The diegetic prototypes shown in this video are a key result of this research.

This paper explores the design and future potential of virtual funerals, enabling both in-person and remote participation, with options to digitally revisit and update the memorial site. While virtual funerals gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic and are often seen as temporary, the authors argue that they hold long-term value across different contexts. To investigate future funeral practices, we created a Design Fiction film depicting our concept of virtual funerals in Japan using Diegetic Prototypes - hypothetical technologies that envision a future in which these practices are normalized. Key themes include hybrid attendance, virtual memorial spaces, and technologies that bridge in-person, remote, and revisiting participants. The authors and a professional crew created the film collaboratively to illustrate these speculative elements. This paper details the film's production, its design rationale, and the broader implications for how HCI design and technology could shape future mourning and memorialization practices.

本研究では，日本古来からの絵画形式である絵巻物にデジタルテクノロジーを組み合わせた絵巻物型メディア「デジタル絵巻物」のデザインを行い，動画と静止画のハイブリッド表現，身体性インタラクションといった要素を含んだ新たな表現メディアの実現を目指した．さらに，コンテンツ制作ワークショップと様々なクリエイティブ系の専門家へのインタビューを通して，鑑賞と制作の両面から本デザインのメディアとしての価値を探究していく．

近年推進されているSTEAM教育では,探究と創造のサイクルの重要性が指摘されている.STEAM教育の一環であるプログラミング教育において,授業時間だけでなく授業時間外での児童の活動も視野に入れた創作・プログラミング学習環境をデザインすることにより,探究と創造のサイクルをより促進することが期待できる.そこで,本研究ではタンジブル環境で作業を行う「授業パート」とバーチャル環境で作業を行う「授業外パート」の大きく二つの要素で構成された新しい創作・プログラミング学習環境のデザインを提案する.本研究はまだ実施途中なため十分な実証実験やデータ収集は完了していないが,デザインの概要およびプロトタイプについての説明をし,2024年の3月に小学校六年生の児童を対象に実施した授業パートの予備実験の結果についてまとめ,考察していき,本研究の意義や今後の展開について議論していく.

本研究では伝統的な日本の絵巻物とデジタル技術を融合させた絵巻物型インタラクティブデバイス「EMAKI」における動画と静止画の同期手法の検討を行った.これまでの研究では,絵巻物のインタラクションと動画と静止画の組み合わせによる表現は試みられてきたが,同期の精度には課題が残った.そこで本研究では巻き筒の回転をモーターで制御し同期の精度を向上させる新しい実装を試み検証実験を行った.実験の結果,本実装は従来の手動制御に比べて大幅に同期精度が高くなった.本研究は,伝統的な絵巻物のデジタル化と新たなインタラクションデザインの可能性を示すものであり,関連研究領域に新しい知見を提供する.

This paper discusses the design and practice of ESD (Education for Sustainable Development) through an online video co-creation workshop for Japanese high school students. Our research group has designed a workshop program that co-creates short videos to promote the UN SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals). The workshop took place from July to December 2020 and involved 112 Japanese high school students. The workshop consists of four phases: Research, Planning, Making, and Reviewing. Through questionnaires and qualitative observational surveys, we analyzed whether participating students could learn the seven abilities and attitudes emphasized in ESD in each phase. As many learning environments shift to online due to COVID-19, this paper explores ESD workshops that can be realized even in online environments, contributing to ESD research.

This paper discusses the design of a video blog to enhance the social presence of educators in MOOCs. Social presence is considered to be one of the critical factors in education, and MOOCs are no exception. However, in the most existing MOOCs, educators' social presence is limited due to its predefined, linear course structure, as well as text-based semi-synchronous conversation. Hence, this research proposes a daily video blog, which focuses on presenting: 1) Educators Biography; educators' background and experience in the subject area, 2) Educators Feedback; educators' response to learners' questions raised in the course, and 3) Educators Discussion; educators' debate on the latest trends surrounding the course topicto further augment educators' social presences. This paper studies the computer science course of FutureLearn which was conducted in October 2018 and April 2019. A series of short videos were uploaded per day on YouTube and shared with learners alongside the four weeks course. Through observing educators and learners' behavior, as well as conducting interviews with learners, the findings suggest a positive impact of a video blog on enhancing educators' social presence and further opens up new possibilities and new ways in designing MOOCs.

This research discusses how cultural heritage resources can be designed and used as Generous Interfaces alongside MOOCs, to encourage open-ended explorations in digital heritage collections. As an online platform, MOOCs is opening the doors to one's cultural collections by making their digital materials available for educational use, and further enriches the cultural heritage experience. This paper presents the practical experience in creating a generous interface in coexistence with MOOCs-The courses developed by Keio University, focusing on the history, culture, and design of rare Japanese books-And allows learners to explore contextual details, as well as connections across digital cultural heritage.

This paper discusses the design of online video co-creation workshop for ESD (education for sustainable development). Our research team designed and practiced a workshop program for 112 Japanese high school students from July to November 2020. This workshop program aims for high school students to acquire abilities, attitudes, and key competencies emphasized in ESD through co-creating short videos promoting SDGs activity. Focusing on the four teams that were particularly effective from the quantitative data of the workshop, we will analyze the work process of those teams and summarize the design recommendations for the video co-creation workshop. This research explores the possibility of online video co-creation as an ESD method and contributes to sustainable ESD research even in the era of COVID-19.

This paper discusses Plane-Gazing Agorá, a cyber-physical environment at the airport observation deck that stimulates taking and sharing photos of airplanes. Since airports worldwide are on intense competition, airport operators are recognizing the need for differentiating themselves. Our research spotlights the airport observation deck; focusing on the customers’ activities on taking and sharing photos of airplanes. The experience at the observation deck is site-specific and unique, hence we see the potential to contribute to the need for differentiating themselves. Plane-Gazing Agorá consists of the following 2 phases. (1) Photo-taking support by interactive displays installed in various spots on the deck and app. These display information about the upcoming aircraft and suitable shooting locations. The dedicated app provides congestion information and weather forecast for the deck. (2) Photo-sharing support by a public screen and app. Photos displayed on a large public screen are selected from photos posted by customers. The airplane photographers can post these photos from a dedicated app. This paper seeks a community centered on the observation deck that shall be formed by the experience design of the hybrid of cyber-physical space.

This paper introduces a case study that redesigns graduate school classrooms into massive open online course (MOOC)-like content with remote face-to-face sessions. Due to the influence of COVID-19, the higher-education environment is rapidly shifting to an online environment in many institutions. Therefore, instructors need to transform lessons they have been doing in physical classrooms to an online format. However, just conducting the same talks online is not enough to provide students with satisfactory learning. Instructors need to redesign class content and structure to optimize them for the online environment. In this case study, the research team and an instructor redesigned an existing graduate school class into MOOC-like content. We will discuss the specific methods and benefits of this initiative.

This position paper reports on the design of the Asia Pacific Internet Engineering (APIE) Program: an ICT education program for undergraduate students in the Asia-Pacific region that utilize multiple resources and learning content from existing ICT-related Communities of Practice (CoP). APIE program consists of four components: self-paced online courses, synchronous online sessions, an onsite camp, and an internship. The program structure has been strategically designed to position APIE not only as an online courseware for knowledge acquirement but anticipating its potential to become a new CoP that fulfills the gaps between the current ICT education and the expectation from academia and industry. This study first introduces the program concept and describes the design of components and the implementation plans. It also presents preliminary results from the first pilot runs of the program.