MatrixDesks: Interactive computing desks toward one-on-two educational computing environments

The era of 1:1 educational computing environment where each student has one mobile computing device is not far away. When such technology designed for individuals is applied to group learning, several student grouping problems could be encountered. In this paper, three issues are identified to illustrate the vision of the 1:2 educational computing environments. In a 1:2 classroom, besides the mobile devices, students also have their own computing desks, i.e. MatrixDesks, to solve the potential student grouping problems. By putting MatrixDesks together, a small group can form a shared working space with the combined desktops immediately and they can use their own digital pens as the input devices to work on and talk over it. Meanwhile, the students use their mobile devices to handle the related individual tasks. MatrixDesks is a coordination of applying the mobile computing and invisible computing to collaborative learning, which will lead to the accomplishment of 1:2 educational computing environments.