Robot Theater with Children for STEAM Education

Abstract

To promote STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics) education, we conducted a long-term study in an elementary school as part of an after-school program. We worked with small groups of 5 to 7 year old children in hour long weekly sessions for nine weeks. We introduced the children to a variety of robots spanning a wide range of form factors and technical sophistication. Over the course of our study, the children played with the robots, constructed robot models with clay, and wrote and acted in a theater production with robots. We believe that this technique of using robots as actors in children’s theater productions has significant potential for educating children in a number of fields under the STEAM paradigm.