How to Design Games for Deaf Children: Evidence-based Guidelines

The goal of this paper is to present the first evidence-based guidelines for the design of electronic games for deaf children. According to the most recent deaf literature, playing with such games shows positive effects on deaf children’s visual abilities and working memory abilities. Our review of deaf literature, briefly sketched in the paper, considers such abilities as well as other relevant findings concerning the needs of deaf children most relevant for the design of electronic games for them. The paper also outlines the latest findings of the TERENCE project, which builds electronic smart games for deaf children. All such findings are then use to compile the guidelines, which are presented in the third and final part of this paper.