Aelius and the Timeportal 2.0 — Vincent Ruijters

Aelius and the time portal is an interactive history lesson developed for children in the 3rd and 4th grade of primary school. The lesson is aimed at schools located in Dutch cities with a Roman history. The lesson shows young pupils that deep underneath their own feet there is a large amount of Roman objects, Roman buildings and Roman stories to be found. During the interactive history lesson, pupils help a young Roman boy and learn about the local history of their neighbourhood and Roman history in general.

This is second version of the Aelius and the Timeportal project. (fist version documentation also available on this website)
The first version was a lesson that had a real actor and a physical time portal. Due to the success of the first version, we developed a stand alone version for which we created a suitcase that contains everything that is needed to run the history lesson. The second version allows schools to use the lesson independently and whenever they want.

Release

7 February 2013
Vleuten-De Meern, Utrecht

Made by : Vincent Ruijters

In collaboration with : Hilde de Wit, Mike Engelsman, Berta Stössel, Tessa van Asselt, Wijnand Veneberg

Suitcases are available for schools at

District Service Center Utrecht South West, Utrecht, The Netherlands
Historical Association Vleuten De Meern Haarzuilens, Utrecht, The Netherlands

This project was assigned by de Historische Vereniging Vleuten-De Meern-Haarzuilens.
Thanks to the municipality of Utrecht, Birgit Postma Projecten en Happycoders.

About the lesson

In short, the history lesson starts when a ‘professor’ (played by an actor) visits a class, introducing his invention to the young pupils: a time portal. A time portal is a ‘window’ that allows you not to look outside, but to look into the past. Since the pupils are literally on top of Roman history, the professor hopes to connect with the Roman era through the time portal. When the time portal is activated the children indeed connect with the Roman era. Together with the professor the pupils meet Aelius, a young Roman boy who has been locked up by his boss after he accidentally spilled some food. Aelius asks the children if they can help him escape his imprisonment by looking for different Roman objects with a ‘stuff seeker’.

The children go outside on a scavenger hunt to search for special tiles placed around their school. When scanning these tiles with the ‘stuff seeker’, the children learn about the object by a short story told by Aelius. Objects to be found are a lucky coin, a key, a chicken, Roman sandals, Roman army attire, a toga and a Civic Crown (corona civica). These objects all have had a significant meaning in the Roman history. For example: the lucky coin represents the shift from trade towards the use of money. Also, during the Roman era, exotic products such as dates and chicken from the south of the Roman empire were introduced to the north of the Roman empire (e.g. the Netherlands). Pupils are educated about the historical significance of the Roman objects and have to answer five questions on each of the objects.

After the pupils find the seven objects, they go back into the classroom to send the objects back to Aelius through the time portal. The key allows Aelius to unlock his prison, the sandals to protect his feet and the Civic Crown to give him status. Of course, the lucky coin brings back all his luck and Aelius gets to fulfill his dreams!

About the app

The ‘stuff seeker’ is an iPad with an Aelius app using augmented reality. There are seven tiles with AR-codes placed around schools in Utrecht. When these tiles are scanned with the iPad, a 3D-model of the object appears and Aelius describes his personal story and the historical significance related to the object.

About the project

The project started as a graduation project from students from Utrecht School of the Arts (HKU) and Utrecht University. The project was initiated by the city of Utrecht and was part of the Portico student challenge, an international project among six student groups from the UK, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands collaborating on different projects to preservate the cultural heritage and history of their own city in an innovative way.

AELIUS AND THE TIMEPORTAL 1.0と2.0 は欧
州連合からのコミッション制作である。ユトレヒト市にあるロマン文化史を教えるための革新的なレッスン。AR技術を用いる宝探しのような体験しながら、活動的に文化史について習えるレッスンである。

受賞・入選
[欧]International Portico Student’s Challenge 1等賞
[欧]Charlemagne Youth Prize国家賞
[欧]Heritage in Motion Award 入選

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