Utilization of Robotics in Higher Education

The use of technology in the classroom has evolved from the most primitive to the widespread use of personal computers. One of the trends in technological advancements to enter the classroom is the use of robotics. The relationship between robotics and education spans many years. This paper details Papert’s Constructionism theory defining learning as being more effective when students are “constructing” or “doing” activities that are personally meaningful. Research includes assessment of experiences of this method of teaching Information Technology through robotics at such institutions as West Point, Reykjavik University and University of South Florida. Based on the experiences reported at the various institutions, authors conclude with recommendations to Bryant College as the college launches an integration of the utilization of robotic components into the Information Technology curriculum to more effectively introduce students to Information Technology concepts

Using Robotics to Equip K-12 Teachers: Silicon Prairie Initiative for Robotics in Information Technology (SPIRIT)

The Silicon Prairie Initiative for Robotics in Information Technology (SPIRIT) is a unique collaborative effort between the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) College of Engineering, the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) College of Education, and the local Omaha Public Schools (OPS) system. With funding from an NSF ITEST grant, from 2006 – 2008 the initiative recruited and trained 97 math and science middle school teachers through summer workshops and follow-up sessions during the school year, with the goal of equipping teachers in hands-on engineering design principles and providing curriculum development support for STEM instruction. The centerpiece of the training was the university-level TekBot® educational robotics platform developed at Oregon State University, later replaced by the CEENBoT™ mobile robotics platform developed at UNL in the Computer and Electronics Engineering (CEEN) department. More than 9,000 students are expected to eventually participate in this model through in-school and summer programs developed by SPIRIT-trained teachers 1

Simplification of Robotics Through Autonomous Navigation

With self-driving vehicles, college campus food delivery, or even automated home vacuuming systems, robotics is undoubtedly becoming more prevalent in everyday society and it can be expected to continue with time. While many people are owners, users, or even just spectators of theses robotic products or services, there seems to be a negative perception of robotics that poses an intimidation factor regarding the attempt to understand the ideas driving technology. This perception tends to view robotics as machines that require rich education to understand the complexity and interworkings of, thus attempts understand the field are neglected. To combat this line of thinking, I have set out to break down concepts of robotics to satisfy the basic understanding of an individual from an untrained background. To do this, I have developed a lesson plan that teaches fundamental principles behind robotics and I have developed a beginner-level autonomous navigation project that participants can do to prove their newfound understanding. From the lesson plan aspect, participants are introduced to electronics, mechanical design, and various programming techniques. When the participant attempts the autonomous navigation project, the individual interacts with a pre-built robot and the focus is on developing ideas of how to program the robot to navigate a unidirectional hallway system in which the robot is able to autonomously travel through system of irregular turns. Participants actively test their understanding through application of their programming ideas to the robot. The inspiration for this project stems from my personal experience with secondary education and my experience as I transitioned into further education, but more iii specifically, the lack of direction individuals similar to me had through these experiences. I come from a part of my city that is known for having a much smaller base of financial resources and is also often perceived to be lesser in terms of educational quality. While my place of secondary education partnered with the local technical school to provide an opportunity to take a robotics course, few were able to take advantage of this opportunity. Other than this singular opportunity off campus, there were few other known opportunities within our school to help individuals find interests in STEM based fields and few opportunities that pointed in alternative directions to STEM fields. Unless one had a relative in a field, most individuals were left directionless as to what they may want to do as a future career or what they may want to study if college was an option. As an individual who attended college as a guess as to what to do next with life, selecting a major was also a blind throw at a dart board. The decision on my major was between creative writing and engineering, two very different subjects and if it were not for the simple ideas that I had already advanced through a couple of the beginning engineering math courses and my liking of the idea of “building things,” I would have chosen writing. Even so, the handful of my high school class graduates who also chose engineering had little idea of any differentiation between the disciplines and still barely knew what engineering as a whole was, thus we all chose different disciplines and hoped for the best. Simplication of Robotics Through Autonomous Navigation was created to give learning opportunities to individuals who lack such opportunity and have interest in fields related to robotics, yet may also lack comfort to associate with the field

Build Your Own Robot Friend: An Open-Source Learning Module for Accessible and Engaging AI Education

As artificial intelligence (AI) is playing an increasingly important role in our society and global economy, AI education and literacy have become necessary components in college and K-12 education to prepare students for an AI-powered society. However, current AI curricula have not yet been made accessible and engaging enough for students and schools from all socio-economic backgrounds with different educational goals. In this work, we developed an open-source learning module for college and high school students, which allows students to build their own robot companion from the ground up. This open platform can be used to provide hands-on experience and introductory knowledge about various aspects of AI, including robotics, machine learning (ML), software engineering, and mechanical engineering. Because of the social and personal nature of a socially assistive robot companion, this module also puts a special emphasis on human-centered AI, enabling students to develop a better understanding of human-AI interaction and AI ethics through hands-on learning activities. With open-source documentation, assembling manuals and affordable materials, students from different socio-economic backgrounds can personalize their learning experience based on their individual educational goals. To evaluate the student-perceived quality of our module, we conducted a usability testing workshop with 15 college students recruited from a minority-serving institution. Our results indicate that our AI module is effective, easy-to-follow, and engaging, and it increases student interest in studying AI/ML and robotics in the future. We hope that this work will contribute toward accessible and engaging AI education in human-AI interaction for college and high school students.Comment: Accepted to the Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (2024

Do After-School Robotics Programs Expand the Pipeline into STEM Majors in College?

One result of the growing concerns over the numbers of young people moving into science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM)-related careers has been the expansion of formal and informal STEM education programming for pre-college youth, from elementary school through high school. While the number of programs has grown rapidly, there is little research on their long-term impacts on participant education and career trajectories. This paper presents interim findings from a multi-year longitudinal study of three national after-school robotics programs that engage students in designing, building, and competing complex robots with the goal of inspiring long-term interest in STEM. Focusing on the subset of study participants who had enrolled in at least one year of college (approximately 480 students in 2017), this paper examines program impacts on student attitudes towards STEM and STEM careers; participation in STEM-related college courses; intention to major in STEM-related fields; and involvement in STEM-related internships and other activities. Findings include positive, statistically significant impact on multiple measures of STEM engagement in college for program participants

Computer Engineering Course for K-12 Teachers Assisted by First-Year ECE Undergrads

A sophomore-level course will be designed that introduces computer engineering fundamentals to pre-service science and math teachers in a highly interactive, hands-on environment, using active, cooperative learning methods. In cooperation with existing efforts, it will also be adapted to appeal to in-service teachers seeking a Masters degree in science or math education. It will illustrate how to use microprocessor based, mini-data acquisition systems, and robotics to create projects demonstrating physics and math concepts satisfying the Maine Learning Results and other national education standards. These materials will be distributed over the web. A unique aspect of this effort will be the recruitment and engagement of honors-level first-year Electrical and Computer Engineering and pre-service College of Education students to help develop curricular content that will interest middle and high school students. In-service teachers will be included in the development of pedagogy that efficiently conveys the engineering material to future science and math teachers. This project will introduce the engineering application of science and math, as well as providing a bridge between such informal science innovations as First Robotics, First Lego League, Bot Ball, etc. and the classroom environment. The major benefit, however, to the engineering establishment will be the application of and emphasis on engineering concepts to the science/math K-12 infrastructure. Through this course, pre-service and in-service teachers will be equipped with the tools to illustrate engineering principles and how they relate to concepts normally taught in conventional science and math courses

GOOGLE+: A BOOST TO E-LEARNING EDUCATION & TRAINING @ COVENANT UNIVERSITY

Just as the advancement in Information Technology (IT) continues to evolve and change rapidly over the past few decades, the art of learning, acquiring and dispersing knowledge and information have also continued to evolve rapidly. These rapid innovations and improvements in IT were designed with the aim of boosting knowledge and education at just the click of the button. Some of the most outstanding innovations and inventions in the (IT) world, which have influenced education and learning in this decade are found in social networks such as Yahoo, Google, Face book, twitter, You Tube, to mention but a few. However, recent studies conducted in this regard revealed that these current innovations and advancements in IT have constituted grave challenges to the knowledge and learning process. The teachers / lecturers of this century, during the process of seeking to transfer knowledge to their student, are often faced with the dilemma of finding how best to gainfully occupy the minds of their students within and outside the class room environment. The students who more often than not, distracted by incoming messages, videos, picture of friends, or simply text messages from friends via iphones, laptops, i-pods, or even i-pads etc. The respondent instantly cannot resist the urge to quickly read and send back a reply via either of the means mentioned here. Other students who log on to either of the networks for a specific task are easily distracted or carried away by say, a fresh advertisement or alternate information which dramatically catches the attention of the students. Consequently, they are drawn and carried away by the new piece of information that drastically - in most cases - changes their trend of thought before they are fully aware of the harm done by the distraction. While applying the simple survey methods of research, this paper shall examine the findings of an ongoing study with two groups of students who offer University Wide Courses (UWC) here at Covenant University. Results from the pilot study conducted gives us reasons to argue that a resent product by Google simply known as “Google+” may be that much desired formula that teachers and lectures all over the world, need to boost the teaching and learning experiences of both teachers, students and researchers within and outside the classroom environment

Promoting academic excellence amongst the engineering students

This paper describes activities carried out by the College of Engineering at Universiti Tenaga Nasional (UNITEN) in order to promote academic excellence amongst the engineering students and to enhance their academic standings. The issues affecting the academic performance are briefly discussed. The activities involve all students majoring in Electrical, Mechanical and Civil Engineering at UNITEN. The discussions highlight some examples of the orientation and motivation programs, student support system, engineering related enrichment activities and outcome-based education. The objective of this paper is to share the experiences gained when conducting these activities and how they benefit the students

"This is not 13th Grade": Making the Transition to College through Coding

The Summer Coding Academy 2017 at the University of the Incarnate Word (UIW) was designed for the first-year freshman and transfer students with a declared Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) major. The camp participants were from diverse STEM fields that included engineering, biochemistry, nuclear medicine science, biology, computer information systems, meteorology, and 3-D animation & game design. The objectives of the camp were (1) to improve the student’s preparation for a rigorous STEM degree, (2) to increase their skills in communication and data analytics through coding and robotics. This paper describes the teaching materials that we utilized, the results of students evaluations, lessons learned and the future work.Cockrell School of Engineerin