Robotics in Education : New Platforms and Environments

This is the second of two special issues on robotics in education. Robotics projects provide an opportunity to directly interact with technology and design and implement the variety of concepts that they embrace. Seymour Papert termed this style of learning “constructionism” [1]. This approach to learning and teaching creates an active learning environment where students can explore a significant design area, make hypotheses about how things work, and conduct experiments to validate their new gained knowledge and assumptions. Using inexpensive robotics platforms, this approach is being used at the primary and secondary school level to introduce children to technology and teach concepts in computing, mechanics, electrical engineering, and design. It is also being used at the university level in a variety of engineering disciplines, such as industrial engineering design courses, electrical engineering microprocessor courses, mechanical engineering dynamics and control courses, and computer science courses, such as introductory programming and artificial intelligence. Robotics projects are also being used in cross-discipline courses, such as biological computing, and in outreach programs. With the recent development and marketing of inexpensive robotic platforms, most notably LEGO Mindstorms and the Handy Board, the use of robotics in teaching and research has become readily available. More importantly, these platforms have made the area of robotics accessible to everyone by removing the need to have background knowledge in electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and computer science. Educators in many institutions have also created new platforms and extended the current platforms to better fit their needs. The five articles in this second special issue on Robotics in Education describe interesting projects and competitions, many of which extend existing robotic platforms. They discuss their experience of using these platforms in courses of different levels. We hope these articles will help inspire educators to devise innovative ways of introducing robotics in their courses as well as outreach programs. “From Science Projects to the Engineering Bench,” by Oleg Gerovich, Randal P. Goldberg, and Ian D. Donn, describes a high-school competition in which needles are added to the LEGO RCX platform to create a robot that can perform simulated surgery: the removal of a grape from transparent gelatin. Though simulated, this design is a good approximation of real-world robotic surgery that allows the surgeon to operate remotely, away from the X-ray machine present in many procedures. “Introducing Parallel Manipulators Through Laboratory Experiments,” by Imme Ebert-Uphoff, describes how simple, inexpensive prototypes of parallel manipulators can be created using ROBOX RCS-6 and servo motors. Her experience indicates that the prototype is an efficient tool for teaching undergraduates the basic concepts of parallel manipulators as well as strengthening concepts and techniques in linear algebra, kinematics, and computer programming. “ROBUS,” by François Michaud, André Clavet, Gérard Lachiver, and Mario Lucas, describes a new, inexpensive robotic platform used by electrical engineering and computer engineering freshmen in their multidisciplinary projects. Their students designed and programmed robot toys that interact with autistic children, an application that has both technical challenge and social impact. In “Robotics in the Classroom,” Stephen Bruder and Kevin Wedeward describe another new, inexpensive robotic platform created at New Mexico Tech (NMT) for their robotic outreach program. Their experience indicates that their NMT mobile robotic kit, combined with detailed Webbased instruction and course material, is an effective tool for promoting independent robotic programs at the secondary school level. In “Surf, Turf, and Above the Earth,” Christopher Kitts describes his extensive effort in incorporating robotics into education and research at both undergraduate and graduate levels, especially in year-long senior design projects required for all engineering students. This experience indicates that the development of robotic systems is a valuable and viable strategy for employing hands-on learning techniques in engineering education.