Grandpa is a wise man. We all love to interact with him. Unfortunately this has become very difficult because of his progressive blindness and deafness. He can still see and hear a little bit, but sometimes we have to repeat many times a word or a gesture so he understands even simple things like yes or no.
Patricia Diaz wanted to build a robot that could transmit clear messages in familiar ways. Yes, no, maybe, and numbers could be translated into signals that grandpa would understand by touching the robot. Leonardo Tanenbaum-Diaz (Patricia's son) suggested thumbs-up for yes, thumbs-down for no and thumb-in-the-middle for maybe. He even built his own touchalator for The Chestnut Hill School science fair.
	Rachel Schwartz joined Patricia and brought new ideas like adding a tapping mechanism that broaden touchlator's vocabulary and making it wearable. There were many other suggestions from Professor Robbie Berg and Professor Franklyn Turbak and other students in the Robotic Design Studio at Wellesley College; some we incorporated, other should be explored in the future.