Learning with Learning Robots: A Weight-Lifting Project

Robotics projects of novice engineering students commonly focus on modeling predetermined reactive behaviors. This paper proposes an alternative approach, namely engaging students in creation of and experimentation with learning robots. To verify the feasibility of such approach, we conducted a case study, in which two novice engineering students constructed a humanoid robot and implemented a robot learning experiment. The project assignment was to build a humanoid robot capable to learn to adapt its posture while lifting various weights. The students successfully performed the project. Their robot learned from successes and failures of its trials while referring to analytical analysis made by a remote computer. Our case study showed that practice in teaching a robot to learn had significant advantages: It introduced the students to advanced concepts of robotics and AI, taught to perform engineering experiments by combining empirical and analytical methods, and inspired thinking about learning and meaning-making.