RoboStem and English Education School Engagement - Potential of the Concept, State of the Evidence_Fredricks et al._2004

Today I participated in a RoboStem activity. I try to see this experience in 

terms  of English Education and Engagement. Regarding engagement, please 

refer to Fredricks et all(2004)

   1. Summary

After introduced to robot kits and parts, I began to put together the parts to make a race car. What I found out was that building up a racing car was really interesting. It was like kids’ playing with Lego. I experienced that I was absorbed in assembly activity. The process of making a race car was not complicated but the manual book was not user-friendly. I had to guess and find out where a part should be put together to a certain position. What I have learned is that people learn by doing or creating something. Just reading or watching educational materials are not enough. Therefore, integrating robotics with STEM could be effective in the sense that it facilitates learning process by making students engaged in learning.

2. RoboStem and English Education

    I try to see what I learn here in terms of English Education. Learning STEM with robotics entails following directions from teachers and manual books. It means English learners should listen, read, and speak to ask what they don’t know. Therefore, RoboStem provides a natural environment for learning English. In the process of making robots, they learn names of the parts and tools. Then, teacher can make students collaborate in groups to make students help each other while they read the manuals. The students can also program together to make the robots move. One thing for certain is that they will learn English vocabulary in the process of assembly and programming as well as STEM.  

3. Engagement

   How can I engage learners in virtual learning environment? That is one of my research questions. Robot assembly and programming is beneficial for behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement since it involves kinetic movement of students’ body,  students find the activity fun, and programming requires students to use their cognitive strategy or ability. It would not be easy to provide such an authentic environment for learning in a website. However, in virtual environment, making students engaged affectively and cognitively would be possible. In robot assembly, making and programming makes students use their brains while they find it fun. Creating such an environment is my task this year.

4. The Era of Creators and Interventions in the Future.

   I believe this century we live in is creators’ era. 10 years ago, it was not that easy to produce, create, publish, and share. However, thanks to the power of digital technology, lots of things have been made easy. You can design what you imagine with 3D modeling program and produce it with 3D printer. If you are comfortable with HTML and CSS, you can publish your e-books anytime. RoboStem corresponds to what students need to learn right now. They need to make their own and share it with other people. In the process they will learn and grow. However, I should ask myself if I can make any artifacts which help students create something and share. That should be a basic question for my research.