NHK Learning Fair 2001 The "NHK Learning Fair 2001" was held at the NHK Broadcasting Center in Shibuya, Tokyo from November 16 to 18. The fair's themes were children's education and future and the role that the public broadcaster plays in education. It included a variety of public events, including exhibitions using the latest technology developed at STRL. By providing a learning experience that incorporated play, these events demonstrated to many of the children visiting the site that learning can be fun. Puppet show in a virtual studio: "Adventure! Mekarappa" This futuristic puppet show was created in a virtual studio with CG background images. Children were invited to experience the virtual studio firsthand. English conversation: "I want to hear it spoken slowly!" Application of a speech rate conversion technology, which is already being used in language study programs, makes it possible for a user to listen to a skit from an English conversation program at a slower than natural rate, while maintaining the same voice pitch. Braille educational programs using data broadcasting "Information barrier-free reception terminals" These reception terminals convert data broadcasting information into Braille to assist those with visual impairments. In the exhibition, the technology was used to provide Braille information to visually impaired children. Let's play "Zawazawa mori-no Ganko-chan" By automatically measuring the location of a subject, the new 3-D Axi-vision camera can compose CGs without having to use the chroma-keying technique. At the learning fair, an Axi-vision composed a CG of the popular dinosaur character "Ganko-chan", which entertained the children. "Experience the future classroom!" "NHK's all-digital educational material" Visitors experienced a future classroom environment in which students use all-digital educational materials. For instance, visitors were shown how a video report could be created by retrieving video material from a digital video database. Chinese conversation: Check your pronunciation This exhibition featured a pronunciation lesson in which the student could compare his or her own pronunciation against a model in the form of a graph by using the language training tool "Seicho Nigo." This tool is currently used in the Educational TV program "Chinese conversation." Closed-captioning broadcast for children: "News broadcast transcription system" This system, which has already been partially implemented in some news programs, automatically converts the speech portion of a news program into a transcription. During the fair, a demonstration was made of a closed-captioning service for children with hearing impairments.