How Do Pupils Perceive Educational Robotics as a Tool to Improve their 21St Century Skills?

Abstract

In the past years, the use of educational robots has steadily increased, in particular due to the ongoing digitalization of modern societies and the new skills that professions require. It has been argued that educational robotics activities have the potential to promote the acquisition of such skills and may increase pupils' interest in STEM disciplines. Despite these results, only few studies have examined the pupils' perspective regarding the pedagogical value of educational robotics in formal education. Therefore, in this study with 91 pupils aged between 13 and 15 years, we aimed at investigating how pupils perceive educational robotics as a tool to improve their creativity, collaboration, computer science and computational thinking skills and to foster their interest in STEM disciplines. Over a period of one semester, the pupils worked with the robot Thymio II and evaluated their experience through a questionnaire. The results showed that boys and girls have different perceptions on which competences they could enhance: while boys affirmed more often than girls, that they could improve their computer science and computational thinking skills, the opposite was found for collaboration and creativity. Moreover, the results illustrated that educational robotics activities could increase the interest in coding, computer science and engineering, however, this was predominantly observed in boys.

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https://infoscience.epfl.ch/record/275426?ln=en

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In the past years, the use of educational robots has steadily increased, in particular due to the ongoing digitalization of modern societies and the new skills that professions require. It has been argued that educational robotics activities have the potential to promote the acquisition of such skills and may increase pupils’ interest in STEM disciplines. Despite these results, only few studies have examined the pupils’ perspective regarding the pedagogical value of educational robotics in formal education. Therefore, in this study with 91 pupils aged between 13 and 15 years, we aimed at investigating how pupils perceive educational robotics as a tool to improve their creativity, collaboration, computer science and computational thinking skills and to foster their interest in STEM disciplines. Over a period of one semester, the pupils worked with the robot Thymio II and evaluated their experience through a questionnaire. The results showed that boys and girls have different perceptions on which competences they could enhance: while boys affirmed more often than girls, that they could improve their computer science and computational thinking skills, the opposite was found for collaboration and creativity. Moreover, the results illustrated that educational robotics activities could increase the interest in coding, computer science and engineering, however, this was predominantly observed in boys.

2019

The technological advances of the past years have impressively demonstrated that the digital age is no longer just a science fiction vision of the future - we are in the midst of it. The digital transformation is affecting many areas of our lives, including the educational system. For instance, recent years have shown an increased adoption of educational robotics activities in classrooms. Although educators and researchers have acknowledged the potential of educational robotics, further efforts are needed to effectively integrate them into formal education. As for any kind of educational tool, one key factor for the successful integration of educational robots in classrooms is the proper alignment of such tools with the classroom activities and vice versa. In practice, however, this may pose challenges. On the one hand, it still appears that only few educators have already developed the required know-how allowing them to leverage educational robotics for classroom activities. On the other hand, the issue of poor alignment may already arise in the design stages of educational robotics tools, due to the limited experience of developers with the pedagogy and learning theories related to such tools. This thesis, therefore, seeks to study how instructional alignment can be attained in the context of educational robotics. To this end, an alignment framework will be devised aimed at supporting developers in the design of educational robotics tools, as well as educators in the design and implementation of classroom activities involving educational robotics. In this context, we will introduce the notion of Educational Robotics Learning Systems (ERLS), a model that conceptualizes alignment for educational robotics activities. In different studies, we will illustrate how the devised alignment framework can be used to guide the development of educational robotics tools and activities. The PaPL and CreroBot projects will consider the alignment issue from the developers' perspective. The former is concerned with the development of a tangible programming interface based on accessible materials such as paper and cardboard. The latter will then expand these ideas to the development of a do-it-yourself educational robot. In two other projects, we will then illustrate how the devised framework can be used to guide the development of educational robotics activities. We will first discuss the Thymio lawnmower mission, an activity devised to foster the development of students' computational thinking competencies. Finally, we will present the Thymio Escape Game, an immersive learning activity that has been inspired by escape room experiences. The findings from these studies are intended to make a contribution to the field of educational robotics, specifically by addressing the global research question of this thesis: How can instructional alignment be attained for educational robotics activities?

EPFL2020

The symbiotic relationship between educational robotics and computer science in formal education

Barbara Bruno, Francesco Mondada

Educational Robotics (ER) has the potential to provide significant benefits to edu-cation, provided an increase in outreach by transitioning from the extra-curricular initiatives in which ER has thrived to formal education. As Computer Science (CS) Education is undergoing curricular reforms worldwide, the present study addresses the case of a Digital Education reform that included ER as a means to teach core CS concepts. Approximately 350 teachers from the first four grades of primary school participated in a mandatory two-year continuing professional development (CPD) program. The first year of the program was dedicated to CS and introduced teach-ers to CS Unplugged (CSU) and Robotics Unplugged (RU) activities. As such, we analyse the interplay between these activities and focus on teachers’ voluntary adop-tion of the proposed content in classrooms. This is complemented by an analysis of their perception and recommendation of ER. The findings highlight three main points. Firstly, ER benefits from the integration in the CS CPD, as this provides the necessary traction to introduce ER into teacher practices (the teachers freely devoted 2275 h to ER activities in their classrooms, over two years). Secondly, the pres-ence of ER activities in the CS-CPD allows a higher proportion of teachers to adopt the CS content, as there are teachers that favour one type of activity over the other. Finally, the globally positive perception of ER registered in this study is relevant for two reasons: teachers were not voluntarily participating in the CPD, and results did not differ between pioneers and novices.

2021

EPFL2020