Storytelling by a kindergarten social assistive robot: A tool for constructive learning in preschool education

Kindergarten Social Assistive Robotics (KindSAR) is a novel technology that offers kindergarten staff an innovative tool for achieving educational aims through social interaction. Children in a preschool setting have previously been shown to benefit from playing educational games with the KindSAR robot. The experiment presented here was designed to examine how KindSAR can be used to engage preschool children in constructive learning. The basic principle of constructivist education is that learning occurs when the learner is actively involved in a process of knowledge construction. In this study, storytelling was used as a paradigm of a constructive educational activity. An interactive robot served as a teacher assistant by telling prerecorded stories to small groups of children while incorporating song and motor activities in the process. Our results show that the children enjoyed interacting with the robot and accepted its authority. This study demonstrates the feasibility and expected benefits of incorporating KindSAR in preschool education. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.