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The Robot in the Classroom: A Review of a Robot Role

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Emerging Technologies for Education (SETE 2019)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNISA,volume 11984))

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Abstract

The 20th-century was the age of computers and information communication technology; at the beginning of the 21st-century researchers are exploring the use of robots in the classroom. Our review investigates the implementation of copresent social robots with teaching purposes in a classroom setting in areas other than the teaching of subjects that are closely related to the field of Robotics. We are interested in anthropomorphic robots, with an active role in the classroom and capable of human-like activity. With a search of the WOS database and a subsequent manual search in 19 journals we identified 24 relevant articles which have been included in the analysis. Studies mostly include small number of participating learners. In all studies special conditions are established for the robot intervention in a classroom. Most often robots appear in roles as teacher, teacher assistant and Care-Receiving Robot. Robots interventions were conducted by NAO, Saya, RoboThespian, Bioloid, BAXTER, Darwin, NIMA-Robocop, Robosapien, TIRO. Social robots diverge from the computer-mediated communication technologies, as they are not mediating interaction but are partner in interaction. ITSs and ILEs assist teachers in teaching, while the teacher and a robot have a shared presence in the classroom. The copresent social robots perform a social role by interacting with students. Robotic activities are aimed at delivering learning materials and not primarily for individualised teaching, which encompasses the delivery of feedback and the tailoring learning activities for individual learner’s needs.

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Acknowledgments

The work of Andreja Istenič Starčič was financially supported by Slovenian Research Agency (P2-0210). This research has been conducted for “The 1st Workshop on Artificial Intelligence in Education - Teacher’s Role for Student-centered Teaching - AIE-TRST 2019” organized by Andreja Istenic Starcic, Manolis Mavrikis, Maria Cutumisu, Cristina Alonso Fernández.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Education, University of Primorska, Koper, Slovenia

    Violeta Rosanda & Andreja Istenic Starcic

  2. Faculty of Civil and Geodetic Engineering, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia

    Andreja Istenic Starcic

  3. Institute of Education and Psychology, Kazan Federal University, Kazan, Russia

    Andreja Istenic Starcic

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  1. Violeta Rosanda
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  2. Andreja Istenic Starcic
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Correspondence to Andreja Istenic Starcic .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Craiova, Craiova, Romania

    Elvira Popescu

  2. South China Normal University, Guangzhou, China

    Tianyong Hao

  3. National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Ting-Chia Hsu

  4. Lingnan University, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Haoran Xie

  5. Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy

    Marco Temperini

  6. Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China

    Wei Chen

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Rosanda, V., Istenic Starcic, A. (2020). The Robot in the Classroom: A Review of a Robot Role. In: Popescu, E., Hao, T., Hsu, TC., Xie, H., Temperini, M., Chen, W. (eds) Emerging Technologies for Education. SETE 2019. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11984. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38778-5_38

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38778-5_38

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