TopoTiles: Storytelling in Care Homes with Topographic Tangibles

In this paper we present our initial ethnographic work from developing TopoTiles, Tangible User Interfaces designed to aid storytelling, reminiscence and community building in care homes. Our fieldwork has raised a number of questions which we discuss in this paper including: How can landscape tangibles be used as proxy objects, standing in for landscape and objects unavailable to the storyteller? How can tangible interfaces be used in an indirect or peripheral manner to aid storytelling? Can miniature landscapes aid recollection and story telling through embodied interaction? Are ambiguous depictions conducive to storytelling? Can topographic tangibles encourage inclusivity in group sharing situations? In this paper we share our initial findings to these questions and show how they will inform further TopoTiles design work.