Teaching Head

The Thinking Head Project, funded by a $3.4M Australian Research Council/National Health & Medical Research Council Special Initiative Thinking Systems grant for 2006-2011, consists of a 15-person research team made up of computer scientists, engineers, language technologists, cognitive scientists, and performance artists. The project is centred at MARCS Auditory Laboratories at the University of Western Sydney, and Macquarie University, Flinders University, University of Canberra, Carnegie Mellon University, the Technical University of Denmark, and Berlin University of Technology. The project draws on the expertise, resources and methodological approaches of researchers in HCSNet, the Australian Research Council Network in Human Communication Science.

A major focus of the Thinking Head project is to add the human dimensions of emotion, expression, engagement, empathy and expressivity. The Flinders AI Lab has augmented the original Talking Head to be able to compose poetry, to make eye contact, to follow users with his eyes, and to produce appropriate expressions either based on the content of the conversation or explicit requests to pull a face or put on a particular expression. The new version Thinking Head will debut at the Synthetic Times art and technology exhibition in Beijing in the lead up to the Olympics.

The Flinders AI Lab has a major focus on language and learning, including using real and simulated robots to "ground" language in real or simulated events. Our Microjaea Robot World simulation was originally designed to teach the computer a human language (English, French, Dutch, German, Ukrainian and Chinese have all been targeted in a variety of experiments). But it is also ideal for teaching humans basic language and social skills.

The Teaching Head deploys the Thinking Head and the Robot World together with cameras and microphones to guide, monitor and evaluate a human student. Currently our main focus is teaching Australian school students German, and German school students English.

FMDAT partner Novitatech and the Royal SA Deaf Society are interested in applying the technology to assist children with disabilities and their families, helping teach social skills, lip-reading, and eventually sign-language - and we are actively seeking further partners for these projects.

Further information available at the From Talking Heads to Thinking Heads website.

Chief Investigator(s)

David Powers, School of Computer Science, Engineering & Mathematics
Dr Trent Lewis, School of Computer Science, Engineering & Mathematics
Dr Martin Luerssen, School of Computer Science, Engineering & Mathematics

Other Investigators

Richard Leibbrandt, School of Computer Science, Engineering & Mathematics
Dongqiang Yang, School of Computer Science, Engineering & Mathematics

Research Projects

German Teaching