NSF Awards: 2133028
In this application of collaborative robots, students will create a Neu-pulator, Neurally Controlled Manipulator, human-controlled robot to integrate the engineering design process in STEM education. Neu-pulator is easy and inexpensive for students to design, build and test with readily available lightweight and durable components. Its interdisciplinary modular nature accommodates various hands-on experiential learning activities to teach core science and engineering concepts. We hypothesize that high-interest fields such as assistive and rehabilitation robotics, meaningful learning contexts such as improving human life, and hands-on learning facilitated with human-interactive robots will broaden participation of underrepresented students, including females and ethnic/racial minorities. The impact of co-robotic STEM learning, especially for currently underrepresented students, we theorize will increase student motivation and engineering self-efficacy by creating technologies that help people.
Andres Torres Rivera
Graduate Research Assistant
Thank you for watching our video! We would love to hear what excites you the most about this project and if you have previously used any of these technologies in your classroom or research. We would be delighted to answer any questions you may have for us as well!
If you are a STEM educator, we would like to know if you are interested in teaching this project in your classroom and how we could assist you to make it happen!
Nidaa Makki
Professor
Hello Andres,
Thank you for sharing your work! This is a very innovative use of robotics in middle and high school settings, and while I have not used neurally controlled technology in my work, I am very interested to learn more about it. I agree that the connection between interactive robotics and their applications in improving human life has potential to impact a diverse group of students. It sounds like you're currently at the planning phase to implement the program. How are you recruiting teachers to work with you on implementing the technology in their classrooms (for example, are you focusing on technology teachers)? and have you heard any concerns from teachers about participating in this project?
You also mentioned professional development for the educators. Can you share more about the expected outcomes from the PD? and finally, what are some of the challenges that you expect educators to have with using this technology in their classrooms?
Ahmed Soliman
Graduate research assistant
Hello Nidaa,
Thanks so much for your comment.
We are recruiting teachers based on databases of engineering technology teachers in Indiana (in our first phase) and previous interactions of the principal investigators of the project. We will be looking to mail out fliers electronically and in mail, teachers will get personalized packages inviting them to participate in our PD. Based on the volume of responses, we will select teachers that best fit the objectives of our project. We haven't heard any concerns about participating in the project, we have received feedback from our pilot study about optimizing assembly instructions, helping us balance the "too much and too little information" equation.
The expected outcomes from the PD :
Expected challenges : The Neu-pulator is a novel concept and will need teachers to be flexible, thus configuring the human sensor interface for the first time might be challenging. We will spend ample time during our PD on this aspect, we will make sure teachers feel empowered and comfortable using and debugging the EMG sensor.
Scott Pattison
Research Scientist
Thanks for the great video, Andres, Tonya, and team. Like Nidaa, I'm interested in your goals around broadening participation and supporting learning for diverse students. I'm curious, were you able to work with students and families from specific communities when developing the technology and support resources? And in what ways do you think this tool can help teachers shift their teaching practices to make STEM education more equitable and inclusive. Thanks again!
Tonya Isabell
Graduate Research Assistant
Hi Scott,
Currently, we are working with teachers in Indiana, and in the third year of the grant, we will work with teachers in Georgia. Working with these two states will allow us to broaden participation to a range of diverse students. We hope that the project will help teachers provide an integrated STEM experience while involving student interest by allowing them to design a machine made to help others. We also seek to assist teachers to make the new unit a part of their yearly curriculum by providing equipment and technical support. I hope this answers your question. Let me know if I can elaborate for you.
Kindest Regards,
-Tonya
Andres Torres Rivera
Graduate Research Assistant
Hi Scott,
I will try to answer your second question since I believe it is a core aspect of this project. Historically, women have been underrepresented in STEM fields. Yet, there is strong evidence that, in general, female students are more motivated by projects that involve helping others and improving quality of life in medical settings. By showing ALL students that this is a high impact career path in STEM, they have a chance early in their education to decide if this is right for them. It is hard for me to extrapolate how it will shift a teacher’s future practices, but it will definitely be a strong case study to base future work on.
Kindly,
Andres Torres
Scott Pattison
Research Scientist
Thanks for the additional information, Tonya and Andres. Good luck with your ongoing project!
Amy Wilson-Lopez
Associate Professor
Thanks for sharing this video--it was great to see the neu-pulator in action! I agreed with the teacher that a great strength of this technology is that it is constructed from inexpensive materials such as cardboard. It is great that you have already showcased it at ITEEA. I appreciated Nidaa's question about the project's anticipated impact on teachers. On a similar vein, I wondered what outcomes you were looking at for students, and how you would determine whether you reached your goal of broadening participation. From your abstract, it seemed you were looking at motivation and self-efficacy, and I wanted to hear a little more about how you were defining motivation--how you would know when you saw it. Thanks again for sharing this great work!
Andres Torres Rivera
Graduate Research Assistant
Hi Amy,
Thank you for your question! In this research we can define motivation as “an individual’s desire to achieve a certain goal” and self-efficacy as “an individual’s belief in their own capacity to achieve said goal”. A student’s motivation will be more visible during the design tasks and open-ended problems because motivated students may look for multiple solutions or explore alternatives designs, regardless of how well they perform. On the other hand, students with self-efficacy but no motivation may only come up with one design and stop there.
Kindly,
Andres Torres
Tonya Isabell
Graduate Research Assistant
Good Afternoon Amy,
We are using a mixture of methods to measure self-efficacy as well as the student's engagement in engineering design during the experience. We will conduct interviews, collect engineering design journals, make observations, and utilize a retrospective pretest with a post-test. We are hoping that students will be introduced to and excited by engaging in a design challenge using mechanical and robotic engineering to solve a medical problem. Mechanical and robotics engineering are not traditionally included in medical technology education units and we hope the students will have a different outlook on engineering fields by the end of the study.
Kindest Regards,
-Tonya
Amy Wilson-Lopez
Associate Professor
Thanks for these responses, Tonya and Andres! It sounds like you will triangulate data across a range of sources that will enable strong inferences regarding your approach. I look forward to reading about what you find. Thank you for your great work in inspiring the next generation of engineers and technologically-literate citizens.