Motivating young children to learn is the important topic of this paper. As the authors state in their abstract:

[T]his paper documents the design process for an augmented children’s play environment centered on that most ubiquitous and simple of objects, the cardboard box. The purpose of the exercise is to show how computer technology can be used in innovative ways to stimulate discovery, play and adventure among children...The paper documents the journey from initial design concept, through a number of prototype implementations, to the final implementation (page 41).

Ferris and Bannon are successful in explaining how and why they built and tested a series of prototypes that led to their final implementation. They also provide a vision of how students used and enjoyed the environments (combinations of cardboard boxes) they created. However, they do not fulfill one of the main goals of the paper, since they do not demonstrate how what they have done relates to using computer technology in innovative ways. In fact, there is very little discussion of how the ideas in this project could be transferred to a computer, rather than a cardboard box garden (CBG), environment. Thus, the impact of the authors’ approach is minimized, and could only be replicated by teachers creating a similar CBG.

There were several minor points that made the paper a bit difficult to read. For example, some of the drawings were not clear. Also, the significance of the figures on page 46 was not discussed. Finally, it would be useful to know what the MAX software environment is (page 46), and this was not explained.

In summary, the authors discuss a series of interesting experiments, but do not show how this relates to their goal of demonstrating their environment’s applicability in a computer environment.