麻豆约拍

This week, a brand new interactive experience launches online for the viewers.听The website accompanies the latest . Here, C麻豆约拍 Executive Producer, Japhet Asher, explains the inspiration behind it and how听the听interactive content听was made.

It鈥檚 only the start of January, but I honestly believe that Try Being Me will be one of the most important pieces of interactive content we will launch on C麻豆约拍 in 2013. It鈥檚 not a large investment of license fee payers鈥� money, nor is it a particularly significant or complex technological leap. Instead, Try Being Me uses video, quirky听animations, and thoughtfully produced game mechanics to give the C麻豆约拍 audience a deeper understanding of the frustrations and difficulties that dyslexia can sometimes bring, in an engaging, visceral and simple way. It鈥檚 an interactive approach to factual content we鈥檝e never tried before. Our aim is to add a physical understanding of the subject to the mental and emotional impact of traditional Newsround journalism.听It鈥檚 the kind of experimental content that only Newsround and C麻豆约拍 would make for British children.

Most people know that C麻豆约拍 is the number one online destination for 6 to 12 year olds in the UK.听 Every week, a million children come to C麻豆约拍 for our mix of games, clips, music and other online activities.听In particular, they come for games around hugely popular brands like Tracy Beaker, Wizards vs Aliens and Wolfblood.听Again, it鈥檚 no surprise that these programme brands drive the majority of our traffic.听But the single brand that can compete, week in and听week out with our strongest games, for a position on the top of the C麻豆约拍 popularity charts is a surprise:听It鈥檚 .

To me, Newsround is central to everything we stand for at C麻豆约拍.听Our commitment to provide the same range of content and genres for children that we provide for grown ups is most apparent in the quality and commitment of the journalists working across platforms on Newsround.听And the Newsround specials, with their visual inventiveness, emotional resonance and in-depth single issue reporting, represent the best of the team鈥檚 work.

When we decided to look at how we could expand the interactive experience of Newsround for our audience, we gravitated toward the award-winning specials, with their spirit of innovation.听How could we enhance the broadcast experience with the strengths of interactive content?听We chose to focus in on one of the defining characteristics of both the NR specials and online games.听The specials use individual children鈥檚 stories to illustrate a much wider issue.听Games allow each individual child to have an experience of the wider whole.听In combination, we can let each child have his or her own personal experience of the subject.听You reach millions, one child at a time.

We have made games for factual content regularly at C麻豆约拍.听听补苍诲听听games are among the most popular.听A recent game in support of , a series about lifesavers including the Coast Guard and Fire Brigade, has also been a great success.听But these games are about immersive adventures in our own world instead of within a fictional narrative.听With Newsround specials, we would be trying to use game mechanics to help users get inside the minds of real kids, not for an adventure but for an insight into how they think and feel.听It鈥檚 a daunting challenge.

Our in-house development team had been inspired by some of the interactive work produced by the , in particular the Pinepoint project 鈥� a visit to a vanished mining community - and a curiously affecting piece called , which the NFB describes as a film you can play.听Could we create that same kind of visceral experience to sit alongside the emotional and intellectual understanding of personal dilemmas portrayed by Newsround specials when dealing with tough topics like bullying and autism?

Try Being Me is the result of that challenge.听We are not attempting to provide a literal portrayal of how the dyslexic mind functions nor are we trying to create a comprehensive website on the subject.听 As a companion to the broadcast special, the role of the interactive experience is to enhance our audience鈥檚 understanding of the dilemmas and coping mechanisms described by the children featured in the special, living day to day with dyslexia. We meet Ben, Khalaya, Zach and, uniquely online, Rebekah.

Online producer Nikki Stearman worked with the Newsround production team to select moments from interviews with each child where they described how they visualized their daily challenges.听For example, Zach sees his brain as being differently wired, and that makes it hard for him to picture letters in sequence.听Rebekah invents mnemonic images that remind her how to spell tricky words.听 She uses the example 鈥淗airy Astronaut Likes Fish鈥� to remember the word 鈥渉alf鈥�.

Nikki and project manager Vicki Neal worked with Sheffield based agency to develop individual games and animations to illustrate each child鈥檚 thoughts.听As the user plays the games, the challenges get harder, more pressured and increasingly frustrating.听In-game messages encourage the user to connect what they are feeling as they play, to the simple everyday acts of spelling a word or remembering a list of things to do.听If a player chooses to quit a challenge, they can, but they鈥檒l be reminded that, 鈥渋f you have dyslexia, you can鈥檛 give up鈥�.听For us, Try Being Me听蹿辞谤 My Dyslexic Mind听is just the start.听If it works, we plan to apply this approach to new subjects in the year ahead, always looking for new ways to inspire our audience.

It鈥檚 inspiring to me that so much of our audience comes to Newsround week in and week out, whether to feed their curiosity and thirst for knowledge, or just to get their homework done.听We all need a little help sometimes.听And help begins with understanding.听If Try Being Me听succeeds in helping even one of our audience better understand how it feels to be living with dyslexia, and better understand a friend or classmate as a result, then that鈥檚 a great start.听As I said, you reach millions, one child at a time.

The Newsround special broadcasts on the C麻豆约拍 Channel on听January 7th at 5pm.

Try out the interactive experience on the .听

听