Abstract
Educational robots have proven to be effective at supporting students and teachers in classrooms. However, when schools are not available and education must continue online, the lack of a common physical space for learners and instructors might make it difficult for these robots to be used. Remote education through an online environment is possible but not without some limitations. In fact, when using the home as an educational setting, the lack of physical interaction between children, teachers, and their peers can lead to problems, such as loss of motivation or decrease in attention level. In this paper, we describe the design process of a robot to support children during long distance learning. We conducted a survey to student, parents and teacher to understand the problematic and gather information about the possible use of a robot for support students. We then propose the concept of a companion robot for supporting children during online classes. The robot’s main function is to increase children’s awareness and attention by monitoring the teacher’s voice and redirecting the student’s attention through expressive behavior. Future work will focus on the implementation of the robot and consider additional features.
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Arroyo, D., Guo, Y., Yu, M., Shidujaman, M., Fernandes, R. (2020). Towards the Design of a Robot for Supporting Children’s Attention During Long Distance Learning. In: Wagner, A.R., et al. Social Robotics. ICSR 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12483. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62056-1_28
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