Patent Document

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
   Not applicable 
   STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT 
   Not applicable 
   INCORPORATION-BY-REFERENCE OF MATERIAL SUBMITTED ON A COMPACT DISC 
   Not applicable 
   BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
   1. Field of the Invention 
   This invention relates generally to electronic educational devices, and more particularly to an audio-visual learning device for teaching small children by association of an object such as a musical instrument or an animal which produces a distinctive sound with the viewable indicia associated therewith and description thereof. 
   2. Description of Related Art 
   The availability and relative low cost of electronic education and training devices and systems have had a great influence upon educating people, particularly younger children. By the inclusion of inexpensive yet extremely powerful CPUs, audio synthesizers and the like which may both control system operation and selective synthesized audible words, music and sounds, the scope of these educational and entertainment devices for children, even for families with modest means, has greatly increased. 
   Examples of such electronic educational and entertainment toys and devices are disclosed in the following U.S. patents.
         U.S. Pat. No. 4,280,809 to Greenberg, et al.   U.S. Pat. No. 4,482,329 to Shindo   U.S. Pat. No. 4,997,374 to Simone   U.S. Pat. No. 5,413,355 to Gonzalez   U.S. Pat. No. 5,478,240 to Cogliano   U.S. Pat. No. 5,595,489 to Kwon   U.S. Pat. No. 5,944,533 to Wood   U.S. Pat. No. 6,109,925 to Druckman, et al.   U.S. Pat. No. 6,264,523 to Simmons       

   However, none of these prior art disclosures appear to capture the powerful educational tool of teaching a child to be directed to a viewable indicia representative of an object by directing the child&#39;s visual attention toward distinctive synthesized sound produced by the object which emanates from that viewable indicia. This educational technique of the present invention draws the attention of listening and eyesight of the child to viewable indicia in the form of either a graphic display of an object and/or the word describing the object itself by a sound which synthesizes that which is typically associated with the object itself. For example, if one of the objects displayed graphically on the invention is a cow, a graphic display of a cow will be presented at one location on the device immediately adjacent to which the word “cow” appears in large letters. When the child or attendant selects that viewable indicia by manual activation, the sound emitted by a cow, e.g. “moooooooooo” will emanate from a sound emitting area immediately adjacent or in very close proximity to the viewable indicia itself such that the eye and listening attention of the child is directed to and focused on the viewable indicia by the sound which emanates therefrom. 
   BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
   This invention is directed to an audio-visual educational device including a housing including a plurality of separate viewable indicia each representative of an object which produces a distinctive audible sound associated with the corresponding object. A sound emitting area is also provided in the housing in close proximity to each object. An electronic controller operably mounted in the housing selectively produces and emits or causes to be emitted through an audio output device each of the distinctive audible sounds from the corresponding sound emitting area responsive to manual selection of one viewable indicia. The user then receives an audible queue in the form of the audible sound to look in the direction of sound emanating from the corresponding sound emitting area thereby learning to associate the selected viewable object with its corresponding audible sound. 
   It is therefore an object of this invention to provide an educational toy or device for children which utilizes an audio-visual technique of drawing and focusing the attention of the child to a selected viewable indicia of an object by the characteristic sound of the object and emitting the sound from a point immediately adjacent to the viewable indicia. 
   Still another object of this invention is to provide an educational audio-visual toy for children which incorporates sound direction to draw the attention of the child to a particular location on the device and, in doing so, to cause the child to look directly at viewable indicia or representation of the object which produces the characteristic sound which emanates from that same portion of the device. 
   In accordance with these and other objects which will become apparent hereinafter, the instant invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. 

   
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWING(S) 
       FIG. 1  is a front elevation view of one embodiment of the invention. 
       FIG. 2  is a side elevation view of  FIG. 2 . 
       FIG. 3  is a rear elevation view of the invention as shown in  FIG. 1  with the rear half of the housing removed. 
       FIG. 4  is an enlarged view of the central pivotal portion of the arm assembly of  FIG. 3 . 
       FIG. 5  is a front elevation view of the embodiment shown in  FIG. 1  with the front panel removed. 
       FIG. 6  is an enlarged view of the printed circuitry shown in  FIG. 5 . 
       FIG. 7  is a perspective view of another embodiment of the invention. 
       FIG. 8  is a side elevation view of  FIG. 7 . 
       FIG. 9  is an enlarged broken view of one of the side surfaces of the invention shown in  FIG. 7 . 
       FIG. 10  is an enlarged view of another surface of the embodiment of the invention shown in  FIG. 7 , 
       FIG. 11  is a top plan view of a third embodiment of the invention. 
   

   DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
   Referring now to the drawings, one embodiment of the invention is there shown generally at numeral  10  in  FIGS. 1 to 6 . This embodiment  10  includes a housing  12  having a molded plastic housing front half  18  and a mating molded plastic rear housing half  28 . The two housing halves  18  and  28  define a support base  14  at the bottom portion thereof supportable on a flat surface by bottom surface  14   a  in  FIG. 3 . 
   The outer obverse forwardly facing surface of the front half  18  as seen in  FIG. 1  includes a plurality of viewable indicia  26 , each of which depicts a different object such as a flute, a harp, a piano, a tuba, etc. which produces or is capable of producing a recognizable sound, in this case, musical sounds or notes. Immediately adjacent to each of the viewable object indicia  26  are written or printed words describing the corresponding viewable indicia. Also radially outwardly positioned immediately thereto is a sound emitting area  20  formed of spaced slots adjacent each of the viewable indicia  26 . 
   A rotatable selector  24  is also provided which is rotatable about a shaft  34  which defines central transverse axis of the housing  12  back and forth in the direction of arrow A. The child using the device or someone attendant thereto, would initially manually position the pointer  24  to be aimed at one of the selectable viewable indicia  26  for training or entertainment purposes. Thereafter, the central area  24   a  is depressed to energize or activate the device  10  into operation. 
   Referring particularly to  FIG. 3 , when the pointer  24  is rotated, arm assembly  30  which is also pivotally attached on shaft  34  to the pointer  24 , is also similarly rotated in the direction of arrow A in sequence therewith. Arm assembly  30  includes a sound producing device  36  connected at the distal end of arm member  32  which will emit synthesized sounds representative of each of the selected, viewable indicia  26  displayed on the front housing  12 . Thus, when a selection is made by the manual rotation of the pointer  24  back and forth in the direction of arrow A, the sound emitting device  36  is positioned in alignment with and in close proximity to the inner surface of the corresponding sound emitting area  20 . A series of evenly spaced detents  44  act in alignment with a small protrusion (not shown) on the reverse surface of arm  32  to properly align the sound emitting device  36  to be in alignment with the corresponding sound emitting area  20  selected by pointer  24 . 
   An electronic controller  52  of conventional design is preprogrammed to produce electronic signals which, when received by the sound emitting device  36 , will produce separate synthesized sounds simulating each of the sounds normally associated with the object displayed in the viewable indicia  26  on the front surface of the front housing  18 . Powered by a storage battery  54 , the electronic controller  52  sends and receives signals by a wiring harness shown to and from a printed circuit board  50 . As best seen in  FIG. 6 , this circuit board  50  includes a plurality of electrical contact surface pairs  56 / 58  and two spaced apart circle and ring-shaped contact pairs  60  and  62  centrally positioned on the circuit board  50 . Contact pads  56  and  58  are in operable engagement with contacts  40  and  42  on the opposing surface of arm  32  as best seen in  FIG. 4  while the circular and annular shaped contact  60  and  62  of circuit board  50  are in electrical contact against contacts  36  and  38  of the central portion of arm  32 . By this arrangement, the electronic controller  52  receives positional information with respect to pointer  24  and, when energized by manual depression of the central button  24   a , produces a signal which causes the sound emitting device  36  to emit a synthesized sound which is characteristic of the selected object depicted in one of the viewable indicia selected by pointer  24 . This synthesized sound is emitted from the sound emitting device  36  in alignment with the corresponding sound emitting area  20  so that the child is directed to look at the particular sound emitting area  20  corresponding to the viewable indicia  26  which was preselected by the positioning of the pointer  24 . The learning function is thus enhanced by the child&#39;s focus of attention being drawn simultaneously to a graphic display of an object, the word description thereof, and the characteristic sound produced thereby. 
   By the use of this embodiment  10  of the device, when activated by depression of the central portion  24   a  after the pointer  24  has been positioned to aim at the desired object depicted in one of the viewable indicia  26 , a corresponding sound will emanate from area  20  immediately adjacent thereto. When the child&#39;s gaze is focused on that portion of the front surface of housing half  18 , the educational connection will be made between the particular sound which emanates from the sound emitting area  20 , the graphic depiction of the selected object such as a piano, and the word “piano” immediately adjacent thereto. The attention drawn to these three representations of an object, the viewable indicia, including the printed description, the word describing the object, and the distinctive sound which the object emits provides a powerful educational tool for more rapidly establishing the connection association between the three symbols of the object itself. 
   Referring now to  FIGS. 7 to 10 , another embodiment of the invention is there shown generally at numeral  70  in the form of an educational cube. The housing  72  is formed of plastic material having softer exterior surfaces to reduce impact upon both exterior objects and the battery-powered electronic controller (not shown) contained therein which functions as previously described. 
   This embodiment  70  includes depressible central areas  78 ,  80 ,  82 ,  84  and  86 , one on each of the generally flat surfaces of the cube-shaped housing  72 . Each of the central areas  78 ,  80 ,  82 ,  84  and  86  include viewable indicia of a particular musical instrument, namely a French horn, a harp, a piano, etc. In addition, the viewable indicia includes the printed word(s) describing the object. 
   Formed into each of the central areas are arrays of apertures shown typically at  90  in  FIG. 9  which define a sound emitting area. As also seen in  FIG. 9 , positioned behind each of these central areas (typically  84 ) is a sound producing device  88  which will produce the corresponding synthesized sound of the object depicted on the central depressible area  84  associated with, or characteristic of, the viewable indicia depicted thereon. 
   By this arrangement, the child using this educational device  70  simply depresses one of the central portions  78 ,  80 ,  82 ,  84  and  86  to activate the electronic controller (not shown) within the cube-shaped housing  72  which then produces a signal delivered to the particular sound emitting device  88  positioned behind the viewable indicia displayed on the depressed central portion. The sound emitted from the corresponding sound emitting area  90  will cause the child&#39;s attention to be directed to and focused there so that all of the indicia representative of the object, i.e. the pictorial depiction, the word description, and the characteristic sound emitted from the object are all in focus at one time for the child&#39;s associative educational growth. 
   Referring now to  FIG. 11 , a third embodiment of the invention is there shown generally at numeral  100 . This embodiment  100  includes a housing  102  which supportively holds a series of side-by-side depressible keys  106  each of which includes a viewable indicia depicting an object shown typically at  108 , the word describing the object at  110 , and a sound emitting area  112  behind which is a sound emitting device (not shown). 
   When a particular key  106  is manually depressed, it activates the electronic controller (not shown) within the housing  102  to produce an electronic signal which will be delivered to the sound emitting device (not shown) behind the corresponding sound emitting area  112 . Again, the sound which is emitted from the particular sound emitting area  112  corresponds to the characteristic sound typically produced by the object depicted in the viewable indicia  108  and the word portion thereof at  110 . 
   While the instant invention has been shown and described herein in what are conceived to be the most practical and preferred embodiments, it is recognized that departures may be made therefrom within the scope of the invention, which is therefore not to be limited to the details disclosed herein, but is to be afforded the full scope of the claims so as to embrace any and all equivalent apparatus and articles.

Technology Category: g