Learning from Designing the RoboFesta Blue Peter Robots

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Learning from Designing the RoboFesta - Blue
Peter Robots

• Jeff Johnson, Tony Hirst, Steve Garner
  (robofesta_at_open.ac.uk)
• RoboFesta Research Lab.

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Overview

• The RoboFesta - Blue Peter Robot Design
  Competition
• (A few of the) Submitted Designs
• Prototyping the Winning Designs
• The Robot Design Masterclass
• The RoboFesta International Friendship Games
• Lessons Learned

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Launching the Competition

• Launched by RoboFesta-UK in February 2001 to
  select 4 children who would participate in the
  RoboFesta International Friendship Games at
  Yokohama, November 2001
• Challenge to design a really useful robot
• The design was to be submitted on a single side
  of A4 paper and was ideally to include
• a diagram of the robot
• a specification of what it should do
  (specification)
• an explanation of how it could do this (analysis)
• the design should also be plausible (evaluation)

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Competition Entries

• Three age groups...
• 7 years and under
• 8 to 10 years
• 11 to 15 years
• one open group for online entries
• 32, 000 entries were attracted in all (400
  online) with an age range split 25, 50, 25

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Winner, 7 years and under
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Winner, 8 to 10 years
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Winner, 11 to 15 years
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Winner, Open Age (lt15 years) Online
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Winner, Open Age (lt15 years) Online cont
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Prototyping the Winning Designs

• Prototypes of the winning designs were
  constructed by members of the Open University
  RoboFesta Research Lab
• Constraints
• be as faithful to the original design as
  available building time allowed
• use resources available to the winners wherever
  possible

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Stevens Caterpillar
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Poppys Decorator
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Joels Crack Detector
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Nadines Mine Detector
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Robot Design Masterclass

• Walk through of two simple tasks with verbal
  protocol recorded on flip chart
• making a jam sandwich
• taking a bicycle out of a garden shed
• Each child was then invited to walk through the
  behaviour of their own robot, verbalising each
  action and the reason why it was performed

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Discussing the Designs (1)

• How close was the prototype to the original
  design?
• What were the major differences?
• Why were these differences required?
• Did the walk through/verbal protocol reveal
  anything unexpected about the robots desired
  behaviour (actions, decisions or need for
  feedback)?

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Discussing the Designs (2)

• What were the major constraints on implementing
  the original design directly?
• How could the prototype be improved to more
  closely achieve the functionality of the original
  design?
• How could these improvements be implemented in
  the second prototype?

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The International Friendship Games

• Opened with a cultural exchange in the form of a
  tea party
• Two days of competition
• assemble and decorate a Wonderborg hexapod
• program it to traverse ashort obstacle course

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Lessons Learned - Children (1)

• Designing robots is fun - play with a purpose
• first identify a problem...
• then consider the tasks involved in solving that
  problem...
• then prototype something that can perform those
  tasks
• And building robots is fun too...

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Lessons Learned - Children (2)

• Running through the robots supposed behaviour
  can identify sensing and acting requirements
• The nature of the environment places significant
  demands on a design
• Building prototypes can identify problems with a
  design and suggest improvements to it

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Lessons Learned - Organisers (1)

• The robot design competition suggests that paper
  based design can stimulate children to produce
  creative ideas
• Verbal protocols and walked through behaviour
  sequences can motivate children to think about
  how and why we sense and act in our world

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Lessons Learned - Organisers (2)

• Robot building challenges, although potentially
  intimidating at first, fill children with
  confidence as their constructions come to exist
  and behave in the real world
• Photographic and video records are useful
  resources for widening participation