The College of Engineering and Applied Science’s Interdisciplinary research theme (IRT) on Engineering Education and AI-Augmented Learning has awarded seed grant funding to a new project, Towards equitable robot tutoring: an intersectional analysis of human-robot interaction in racially diverse classrooms. This project is a collaboration between Kaleb and Alessandro alongside Prof. Tiera Tanksley of CU’s School of Education.
This project aims to study racially minoritized students’ interactions with educational robots and AI technologies, with the goal of developing a set of design considerations to help ensure that educational AI is designed alongside – rather than for – students of color. We believe this approach will help create a future where educational AI is a tool for equity and inclusion in the classroom.
In related news, a case study proposal authored by Kaleb and Alessandro, along with Prof. Brad Hayes of CU’s CAIRO lab was accepted into HRI 2021’s Robots for Learning Workshop. This workshop was a great opportunity to discuss design considerations with other researchers doing great work in the field of robotic tutoring.
Our proposed case study will design and evaluate an interactive tutoring system that assesses early readers’ grounded reading skills using proven embodied learning techniques, and adaptively generates practice problems for them to help develop these skills.