Abstract
In this research paper we describe the activities designed for a 5 day engineering design workshop using an educational robotics tool called SmartMotors. SmartMotors are low cost solutions to teach elementary and middle school students about robotics and Artificial Intelligence in under-resourced classrooms. In a few simple steps these motors can be trained by the users to run to various states corresponding to different sensor inputs. We believe that the low cost and trainable aspects of SmartMotors will reduce barriers of entry for both teachers and students in introducing robotics in classrooms and increase student access to robotics and engineering. In the summer of 2022, we used one of our prototypes to run a usability study in a workshop with ten middle school students aged 12–15. The students participated in an hour-long engineering design workshop for five days, and each day they received different prompts along with necessary scaffolding. The participating students had limited prior exposure to robotics and AI. By the end of the workshop, the students were able to train robots in group projects that reflected their individual interests. In this paper, we talk about the students’ journey, starting with building simple projects and subsequently gaining the skills and confidence to showcase diverse and complex designs. We will then discuss the affordances of the tool and explore the opportunities and limitations of SmartMotors in an engineering design workshop.
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Dahal, M., Kresin, L., Rogers, C. (2023). Introductory Activities for Teaching Robotics with SmartMotors. In: Balogh, R., Obdržálek, D., Christoforou, E. (eds) Robotics in Education. RiE 2023. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 747. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-38454-7_20
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