Smart watches, dictionary pens, companion robots...

Intelligent technology accompanies children to grow up happily

Today is the "June 1st" International Children's Day, I believe that many parents give their children a lot of smart technology in the gift list.

Nowadays, smart watches, dictionary pens, companion robots and other intelligent equipment are emerging one after another, some of which can share parents' worries, and some can help children's learning.

So, what is the principle of these technology products? How do they help parents and children? In this regard, the reporter of Science and Technology Daily interviewed relevant experts.

Smart watches:

Positioning and health monitoring in one

Most of the watches worn by children today are smart watches with a sense of technology. Smart watch is a wearable device that combines the functions of smart phones and watches, with core functions such as positioning and anti-loss, audio and video calls, as well as electronic payment, health monitoring, social chat, photography, intelligent recognition and other functions.

For example, when encountering an emergency, parents can know the location of their children through the location function of the smart watch; When two children wearing smart watches want each other's contact information, they can add friends through the "touch" function...

"At present, smart watches are not only loved by children, but also provide parents with intelligent and convenient child care tools." Xiang Ligang, chairman of the Zhongguancun Information Consumption Alliance, said that relevant reports say that in China, smart watches are quite popular among children aged 5 to 12, and 3 in every 1 children has a smart watch.

Xiang Ligang introduced that from the perspective of hardware, smart watches have processors, memories, displays, sensors, batteries, wireless communication modules and other components, which are connected to each other through circuit boards to form the entire system. The software of the smart watch includes the operating system and applications.

So, how exactly do smart watches achieve various functions?

"Smart watches cover indoor and outdoor positioning functions, mainly based on GPS positioning, base station positioning and WiFi positioning three types of positioning technology." Yan Huaizhi, member of the Information and Communication Science and Technology Committee of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and director of the Institute of Network and Security of Beijing Institute of Technology, said that especially indoor and floor positioning, mainly using base station positioning technology, with specific algorithms, supplemented by massive data collection.

The Science and Technology Daily reporter came to a shopping mall counter in Beijing to try a smart watch, after using the watch to make a video call to the bound mobile phone, the mobile phone will display the smart watch shopping mall floor, surrounding stores and watch status and other information, you can also view the historical action trajectory of the watch wearer.

In addition, Yan Huaizhi said that smart watches can also use intelligent monitoring algorithms and highly sensitive sensors to monitor children's physical and sports status around the clock.

"The sensor is located at the bottom of the watch face, and when worn, the sensor is close to the skin, and can monitor various states of the watch, such as acceleration, gravity, position, direction, etc., and the child's movement data can be obtained through the analysis and calculation of these data." Yan Huaizhi added that in addition, smart watches can also collect the wearer's biological data at any time, such as heart rate, blood oxygen, blood pressure, non-invasive blood sugar, body temperature, breathing, sleep status, etc., intelligent analysis of various physiological indicators, supplemented by corresponding apps, can allow parents to grasp the physical health of their children.

Yan Huaizhi reminded that children's daily use of smart watches should avoid falling, bumping or impacting the watch, and prevent contact with solvents and liquids such as soap and water. Secondly, do not charge your smartwatch in a wet state. Again, pay attention to the synchronization matching and upgrade of the mobile app and the smart watch.

"When children use smartwatches, they may become dependent." Xiang Ligang reminded that parents should instruct their children not to operate smart watches during class; In addition, children should be instructed to use the electronic payment function of the smart watch with caution to avoid misuse of recharging the game.

Dictionary pen, translation pen:

"Pack" the tome dictionary into the pen

A small dictionary pen can "hold" a heavy Chinese-English dictionary. Just swipe the target content with a transparent wide "nib" as you would with a correction tape, you can translate between Chinese and English, read sentences aloud, and even explain the scanned target content. Some dictionary pens also have a "vocabulary book" function, which can automatically store new words that the user does not recognize, and then import them into the mobile app for the user to learn and remember.

"The dictionary pen uses infrared scanning technology, which first takes multiple pictures per second through the camera component of the pen head, and then stitches and corrects the small pictures, and then uses optical text recognition technology (OCR technology) for recognition." Xiang Ligang explained.

In daily life, there are many scenarios where OCR technology is used. For example, mobile apps scan business cards, ID cards, and identify the information in them; Cars do not need to register manually when entering parking lots and toll booths, and license plates are automatically recognized.

Yan Huaizhi introduced that it has been more than ten years since the first domestic dictionary pen appeared in 2011. "In the future, there are two main directions for the development of dictionary pens: one is to improve the speed and accuracy of text recognition, and the other is to strengthen the accuracy of language translation." He said.

It is understood that the new generation of dictionary pens not only has the traditional optical text recognition function, but also equipped with a laser-assisted positioning camera, which can realize functions such as sharing, editing and printing.

In addition to the dictionary pen, the "weapon" to help children learn foreign languages is also the translation pen, which has put a lot of effort into translating between Chinese and English. The translation pen can not only explain the meaning of individual words, but also translate sentences and passages (either in text or phonetic form), and the translation results are close to natural language. Some translation pens are also equipped with speakers and displays, which can output the translation results in real time in text or sound.

Xiang Ligang introduced that the translation pen is composed of a scanning head, a recognition engine and translation software. On the basis of OCR technology, the translation pen can also use TTS translation technology, that is, "from text to speech" technology, with the support of built-in chips, through the design of neural networks, and artificial intelligence large model training, to intelligently convert text into natural speech flow.

In addition, in order to prevent children from relying too much on translation pens in foreign language learning, some translation pens now add a "child lock" function. When this function is turned on, the translation pen will turn off the whole sentence translation function, preventing children from doing homework without thinking and developing the habit of over-reliance on such tools.

Companion robots:

Both a "playmate" and a "tutor"

The companion robot can walk and move, is known as a "talking encyclopedia", can easily answer "100,000 whys", and is a robot "tutor" who can take children to learn Chinese, English and programming.

"The companion robot is positioned as a companion, which is neither the child's teacher nor the child's parent, but the child's anthropomorphic 'companion'." Yan Huaizhi said that such robots can achieve accompaniment functions through key technologies such as mechanical transmission, artificial intelligence, and face recognition.

Yan Huaizhi said that at present, with the blessing of ever-changing artificial intelligence technology, companion robots are continuing to improve actions, language, and even provide anthropomorphic expressions with emotions. In addition, the basic functions of such robots, such as face recognition, human body tracking, intelligent obstacle avoidance, automatic charging, and temperature and humidity sensing, are also continuously upgraded.

In terms of interaction, companion robots can realize functions such as taking photos, storytelling, game interaction, voice interaction, picture book reading, content on demand, and two-way video calls.

For example, placing a picture book in front of a robot can recognize the cover and then read out the contents of the book as the user turns the page.

However, in Xiang Ligang's view, companion robots are still in their infancy, and can only complete simple tasks of accompanying play, accompanying students or question-and-answer exchanges. Overall, the product is not cost-effective, far from reaching the level of widespread popularization, and it cannot meet more personalized needs.

In addition, Yan Huaizhi said that long-term robots to accompany children has potential risks.

"No matter how advanced intelligent robots are, they can never replace the company of real humans, especially parents." Yan Huaizhi reminded that the excessive use of similar products should be avoided, otherwise it may cause a certain degree of negative impact on children's language, emotions and interpersonal development.

Smart Baby Caregiver:

Protect children with Wi-Fi technology

In the traditional babysitting scenario, caregivers need to always pay attention to whether the baby is crying, vomiting milk, covering his mouth and nose with clothing, falling out of bed... These problems are always a matter of concern for caregivers. With the transformation of parenting methods to scientific and refined direction, intelligent infant and toddler caregivers came into being.

Many smart baby caregivers are more "cute" in appearance - there is a "big head", in fact, this "big head" is a smart camera, which is placed in the baby's room and can monitor the baby's face, breathing, crying, etc.

When they "detect" an abnormality, they will issue a timely warning, and the caregiver can "see" the baby's every move even if he cannot be by their side at all times.

"Smart infant and toddler caregivers are like parents' clairvoyance's 'clairvoyance' and 'tailwind ears'." Yan Huaizhi said that the smart infant caregiver is essentially a wireless home security protection system, which is mainly composed of a caregiver end and a display end. The caregiver uses wireless network technology to scan regularly to recognize the baby's expressions, movements, etc., and transmit the child's real-time dynamics to the caregiver's mobile phone through the network digital signal in the form of video or audio. When it uses artificial intelligence technology to identify and assess that the baby is crying, it will play soothing music to calm it and send an early warning to the caregiver's display.

It is worth mentioning that the smart infant caregiver has an electronic fence function, and the user can set the child's range of motion, that is, set up a virtual electronic fence through ultrasonic radar. When the child's area of activity exceeds this range, the caregiver will sound an alarm.

In addition, users can also set up childcare areas, which cannot be photographed by some caretakers outside the area, thereby effectively protecting personal privacy.

Of course, parents cannot treat smart baby and toddler caregivers as "universal artifacts".

Yan Huaizhi reminded that the company of parents cannot be replaced by any intelligent product. In addition, manufacturers need to pay attention to privacy protection issues, and take further measures in product functions to better protect the privacy of infants and caregivers.

(Science and Technology Daily reporter Tang Fang)