Tutorials for Children by Children: Design and Evaluation of a Children’s Tutorial Authoring Tool for Digital Art

Ananta Chowdhury, Andrea Bunt

Keywords: Digital art, Drawing, Tutorial authoring system, Sharing workflows, Child-computer interaction, Peer-based learning

Abstract: Digital art tools allow children to express their creativity and can help them develop important skills. There are numerous software tutorials available to help teach and inspire digital art enthusiasts, however, most are authored for and by adults. Given that children are increasingly contributing online digital content, in this paper, we investigate a tutorial authoring design concept where children can capture their drawings and information on their process, with the long-term objective of allowing children to share both their creativity and their workflows with other children. Through participatory design sessions, prototyping, and an evaluation, we explore children’s attitudes towards the creation of digital art tutorials, focusing on their perceived incentives to author such tutorials and how they feel about the concept of sharing their tutorials with other children. We also elicit reactions towards specific design elements. Our findings suggest important considerations for tools designed to motivate and support children’s creation of digital art tutorials.