CANTERBURY College has enlisted the help of two interactive robots to help stimulate young minds in the classroom.
Robots Nao and Sanbot have been making appearances in the school’s digital hub and classrooms this term to perform digital assistance roles and enhance the learning experience of students.
Nao relies on facial recognition technology to make eye contact with students and can answer verbal questions or follow demands to dance, lie down and raise arms.
The robot is currently programmed to understand French, Japanese and English.
Sanbot is equipped with a projector which can be used to read stories to junior student classrooms.
Director of digital pedagogy James Jenkins said he was exploring how to expand the robots’ value to students.
“I think like most new technology it will take a little while to figure out how to use them in the classroom,” he said.
“To apply their knowledge in languages it will take time to discuss with teachers what the robots can do, what the curriculum requires and how to put them together.”
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Mr Jenkins said his ultimate plan for Sanbot would be to assist people with inquiries in the digital hub section of the library.
“We would like to program her with an assistant help desk type of service so she can wonder around the place and if people have a question on how to design a 3D shape she can say: “Look over there, we have got these computers with these programs you can use.” At the moment she is on a timer so when the bell goes off she can tell students to finish what they are doing and go to class,” he said.
“In terms of having the depth of knowledge for other things, that might take a bit longer. With some of the students doing programming subjects, they will be the ones programming that information into her...we will kill two birds with one stone.”
