A Robot In Every Korean Kindergarten By 2013?

kkleiner writes "Elementary school children in Korea in the cities of Masan and Daegu are among the first to be exposed to EngKey, a robotic teacher. The arrival of EngKey to Masan and Daegu is just a small step in the mechanization of Korean classrooms: the Education Ministry wants all 8400 kindergartens in the nation to have robotic instructors by the end of 2013. Plans are already under way to place 830 bots in preschools by year's end. EngKey can hold scripted conversations with students to help them improve their language skills, or a modified version can act as a telepresence tool to allow distant teachers to interact with children."

Comments

This can happen only in Korea

[arivanov]

Have you seen a Korean child? Think of a ragdoll cat. You put it somewhere (with books and toys in hand) and you can safely come back a couple of hours later. It will be there and you will not hear a squeak in the meantime. I have no idea how they do it and I am not sure if I should admire it or get shivers from it.

In any case, a robot will not survive 15 minutes in a classroom with average European (or american for that matter) kids. I know what my daughter will do. If she cannot get her hands on a screwdriver she will craft herself a replacement out of whatever she can find and start disassembling the thing until she has figured out what makes it tick or it is so dead that she will lose interest. That is probably still better than the reaction of her brother who would simply use it for target practice.

Re:This can happen only in Korea

[seifried]

What's destructive/violent about disassembling something to learn how it works? Oddly enough it's what I did as a child, and now as an adult (this skill is particularly valuable in the security industry for finding and fixing vulnerabilities). As for the target practice comment I look forward to teaching my kids how to throw accurately (as an adult I can underhand lob a bag of garbage a good 20 feet into the trash can outside, saving me about half of the walk which is especially practical in a Canadian winter).

Please don't teach children that it is wrong to be curious (e.g. disassembling things). We need people who actually care about how stuff works (hint: you're using a computer. not invented by the timid and afraid to break things)