Amanda Sullivan

KIBO robot demo: engaging young children in programming and engineering

Robotics offers a playful and tangible way for young children to engage with technology and engineering concepts during their foundational early childhood years. This paper describes the development of KIBO, a newly created robotics kit for children ages 4-7 developed at Tufts University through funding from the National Science Foundation. Designed explicitly for very young children, the KIBO kit has gone through several design iterations based on feedback from teachers and children over the past three years. The newest version of KIBO allows young children to become engineers by constructing robots using motors, sensors, and craft materials. Children also become programmers by exploring sequences, loops, and variables. In line with screen-time recommendations for young children, KIBO is programmed to move using tangible programming blocks- no computer, tablet, or screen required.

The Wheels on the Bot Go Round and Round: Robotics Curriculum in Pre-Kindergarten.

clers” that they constructed using parts from LEGO ® Education WeDo™ Robotics Construction Sets. The Robot Recyclers were designed to help carry, push, and/or sort recyclable materials found in the classroom. Researchers were participant-observers in the robotics lessons over the course of curriculum implementation. Each lesson was taught by the researchers, with classroom teachers present in order to facilitate classroom management and assist with small group work. A combination of interviews, video, photographs, and classroom observations were used to document the students’ experiences. Classroom teachers were also interviewed and asked to complete anonymous pre and post surveys. Results from this study provide preliminary evidence that PreKindergarten children can design, build, and program a robot after just one week of concentrated robotics work. Additionally, results indicate that teachers were able to successfully integrate robotics work into their classrooms that included foundational math and literacy concepts while also engaging children in the arts. However, this study also highlights the difficulties and challenges that must be considered before implementing a robotics curriculum into a PreKindergarten classroom, including opportunities for one-to-one adult assistance during building and programming activities.

Collaboration by Design: Using Robotics to Foster Social Interaction in Kindergarten

Research shows the importance of social interaction between peers in child development. Although technology can foster peer interactions, teachers often struggle with teaching with technology. This study examined a sample of (n = 19) children participating in a kindergarten robotics summer workshop to determine the effect of teaching using a structured versus unstructured robotics curriculum on fostering peer-to-peer collaborative interactions. Results indicated that using a structured curriculum was associated with significantly less collaboration than an unstructured curriculum. Findings from this study indicated that to foster peer collaboration, a less structured learn-by-doing approach might be useful for teachers when integrating technology.

Implementing a Robotics Curriculum in an Early Childhood Montessori Classroom.

This paper explores how robotics can be used as a new educational tool in a Montessori early education classroom. It presents a case study of one early educator’s experience of designing and implementing a robotics curriculum integrated with a social science unit in her mixed-age classroom. This teacher had no prior experience using robotics in the classroom beyond a three-day professional development workshop. The case study was constructed by collecting data from surveys, interviews, and a personal blog written by the teacher documenting her experience. The outcome of this research project is a set of suggested criteria for effectively integrating foundational programming and engineering concepts into Montessori early education, based on the inclusion of Montessori tangibles, the need for teacher confidence, and the encouragement of student collaboration.

TUI, GUI, HUI: is a bimodal interface truly worth the sum of its parts?

This study aims to explore the relative differences in efficacy of three different computer programming interfaces for controlling robots designed for early childhood education. A sample of N=36 kindergarten students from 3 different classrooms participated in this research. Each classroom was randomly assigned to one of the following three conditions: a tangible user interface, a graphical user interface, and a hybrid user interface. Comparisons between the three conditions focus on which interface yields better understanding of the programming concepts taught. Implications for designing developmentally appropriate computer programming interfaces for early childhood education are discussed.

Programming with the KIBO Robotics Kit in Preschool Classrooms

ABSTRACT KIBO is a developmentally appropriate robotics kit for young children that is programmed using interlocking wooden blocks; no screens or keyboards are required. This study describes a pilot KIBO robotics curriculum at an urban public preschool in Rhode Island and presents data collected on childrens knowledge of foundational programming concepts after completing the curriculum. The curriculum was designed to integrate music, literacy, and design with engineering and robotics. Children (N = 64) from seven preschool classrooms, ranging in age from 3 to 5, participated in the study. Findings indicated that children as young as age 3 could create syntactically correct programs for the KIBO robot, although older preschoolers (closer to age 5) performed better than younger preschoolers on a standardized programming task. Additionally, all students generally performed better on the programming tasks that required them to manipulate less programming instructions. Implications for designing developmentally appropriate curriculum and scaffolding for young children are addressed.

Girls, Boys, and Bots: Gender Differences in Young Children's Performance on Robotics and Programming Tasks.

Prior work demonstrates the importance of introducing young children to programming and engineering content before gender stereotypes are fully developed and ingrained in later years. However, very little research on gender and early childhood technology interventions exist. This pilot study looks at N=45 children in kindergarten through second grade who completed an eight-week robotics and programming curriculum using the KIWI robotics kit. KIWI is a developmentally appropriate robotics construction set specifically designed for use with children ages 4 to 7 years old. Qualitative pre-interviews were administered to determine whether participating children had any gender-biased attitudes toward robotics and other engineering tools prior to using KIWI in their classrooms. Post-tests were administered upon completion of the curriculum to determine if any gender differences in achievement were present. Results showed that young children were beginning to form opinions about which technologies and tools would be better suited for boys and girls. While there were no significant differences between boys and girls on the robotics and simple programming tasks, boys performed significantly better than girls on the advanced programming tasks such as, using repeat loops with sensor parameters. Implications for the design of new technological tools and curriculum that are appealing to boys and girls are discussed.

BacToMars: Creative Engagement with Bio-Design for Children

We present BacToMars, an educational video game that engages elementary school children in a bio-design activity. We describe its design and implementation, and discuss design considerations for developing playful and developmentally-appropriate interactive activities, which enable children to grasp complex scientific concepts and apply bio-design to solve problems. We share results from preliminary evaluation, and describe next steps in our investigation.

The Impact of User Interface on Young Children’s Computational Thinking

Aim/Purpose Over the past few years, new approaches to introducing young children to computational thinking have grown in popularity. This paper examines the role that user interfaces have on children’s mastery of computational thinking concepts and positive interpersonal behaviors. Background There is a growing pressure to begin teaching computational thinking at a young age. This study explores the affordances of two very different programming interfaces for teaching computational thinking: a graphical coding application on the iPad (ScratchJr) and tangible programmable robotics kit (KIBO). Methodology This study used a mixed-method approach to explore the learning experiences that young children have with tangible and graphical coding interfaces. A sample of children ages four to seven (N = 28) participated. Findings Results suggest that type of user interface does have an impact on children’s learning, but is only one of many factors that affect positive academic and socio-emotional experiences. Tangible and graphical interfaces each have qualities that foster different types of learning

Books, Butterflies, and ‘Bots: Integrating Engineering and Robotics into Early Childhood Curricula

Although we are surrounded by technology on a daily basis, the inner working of devices like phones and computers is often a mystery to children and adults alike. Robotics offers a unique way for children (and grown-ups!) to explore sensors, motors, circuit boards, and other electronic components together from the inside out. This chapter describes how robotics can be used as a playful medium in early childhood classrooms to learn foundational engineering and computer science concepts. By presenting vignettes from three early childhood classrooms that embarked on an eight-week KIBO robotics curriculum, this chapter highlights how educators with little to no prior engineering experience were able to successfully integrate robotics with traditional early childhood content such as literacy and science. KIBO is a developmentally appropriate robotics kit specifically designed for children ages 4–7 that is controlled with tangible programming blocks—no screen time required. The three classroom teachers worked with researchers from Tufts University and Lesley University to integrate KIBO robotics with the teachers’ traditional learning units. The three vignettes will describe the following classroom experiences: using robotics to bring to life the book Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do you See? in the context of literacy explorations; and in science, programming the life cycles of the frog and the butterfly, and using robots to model the movement of worms through different environments. These vignettes will highlight the very different approaches teachers took to introducing robotics to their students and how they utilized the engineering design process as a teaching tool that can be applied to most subject areas.