With regard to interacting with the data, we are working within our software to provide educators and other experts with tools to "annotate" different sections of the data with descriptive attributes like "good trend", "bad trend", "unstable", and so on, that represent what is taking place within that section. For each of these attributes (there are many!) the sonification engine will alter the musical composition that is heard to more closely represent, with music, these trends in the data by using established musical elements (motives, harmony, etc.). Our intention is also to allow students to graphically alter the visually represented data, which would provide them with narrative feedback about what that change in the data shape would actually mean for the data being observed; this would also result in a varied sonififed musical representation of that change. In a classroom, this would allow an educator to "annotate" some data in the way they'd like (musically using attributes and through narrative text), and create activities through which students are asked to manipulate (literally alter the graphical shape of the data) in directed ways to better understand (visually and auditorially) the impact of such changes.

Hi Julia

Thanks! Absolutely, this method could be applied to many data types. We started with materials chemistry as this was an easy entry point for our team. But, many other data types can be used as well.

As Erin mentions in the video, part of our long-term vision is to create a public online data repository in the form of a website where users from many different disciplines can upload and download data sheets that have been annotated and formatted to work with our system.

Thanks, Bridget! We have plans to continue working with experts from different disciplines (beyond just chemical engineering) to expand the possibilities of representing different kinds of data with sonified musical gestures; we're trying improve this type of experience for both teachers and other experts who are knowledgeable about the data they are presenting, and students who are trying to interpret and make sense of the data through multiple representations. Thanks again for the kind words!

Thanks, Janet! We couldn't agree with you more; I'm sure that many of us consider the notion of "student engagement", wow, that concept and the many implications of "engagement" can sometimes be difficult to define! It's well-established that people of all ages "engage" with music in that they feel a sense of ownership and connection to their favorite music as well as a variety of "extra-musical" factors associated with that music such as the musicians, the backstory of the piece of the composer, and so on. Part of our aim in this project is for students interacting with our system to feel a sense of personal connection with the data they are observing (chemical engineering data or otherwise) just as, we hope, those students also feel a sense of personal connection and ownership to the music that they are creating when they first populate the program with data. In this way, even if a student can't play a traditional musical instrument, the Raman spectrometer (or another data-generating device), in a way, can become thought of as the "instrument" through which the notes of their unique and musical learning experience originates. Many thanks for the generous regards!