Sharon Mistretta

By Sharon Mistretta

Traditional robotics instruction in face-to-face classrooms, after-school clubs, and independent competition environments align with expensive, physical robot kits shared by students. Students or parent groups often elect themselves because of previous experience, expertise, or perceived technical ability to dominate the physical robotic platforms’ planning, engineering, building, and subsequent programming. This self-elected grabbing of control leaves students who are not regarded as well-positioned to contribute sidelined to observe the self-appointed experts of the group. Virtual robotics platforms provide educators and coaches with the unique opportunity to give every student access to a robot. Each student learns programming, math, and scientific forces that impact robots through simulated physics algorithms. With their customizable virtual environments, virtual robotics platforms such as Vex VR and Robot Virtual Worlds level the playing field. All students can learn, practice, and subsequently contribute to robotics-centered group projects or competitive teams in meaningful ways. This book chapter delineates the strategies to implement virtual robotics in hybrid classroom environments supported by the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework. Additionally, this chapter reviews how computer-aided design and augmented reality platforms provide students with the opportunity to incorporate 3D objects into virtual worlds.

Part of the book: New Updates in E-Learning

By Sharon Mistretta

Singularity, posited by Kurzweil in his seminal book, The Singularity is Near, marks a time when artificial intelligence (AI) innovation outpaces the human brain’s capabilities. Large Language Models (LLM) such as OpenAi’s ChatGPT, Microsoft’s Bing, Google’s Bard, and Baidu’s Ernie place humanity at a pivotal time where mathematical neural networks surpass, benefit, or deter all facets of human existence. AI bots are prone to emergent behavior that reveals unintended or unexpected abilities, such as learning to translate English into additional world languages. Biases embedded in the training database are prevalent, and an ethical layer of humans in the loop becomes necessary to ensure that LLMs provide responses that benefit mankind. Educators and their students grapple with the intrusion of the capabilities of LLMs that render traditional lesson plans and assessments powerless to authentically measure students’ knowledge of a topic. Dialoguing effectively through prompt engineering becomes a necessary skill to harness the power of LLMs. Weary students and teachers emerging from a disruptive pandemic must grapple with how AI is changing the landscape of education. This chapter will examine the impact of LLMs on students, their teachers, and how the education field can harness AI to augment and sustain learning to prepare our stakeholders for teaching and learning in this new age of artificial intelligence.

Part of the book: Reimagining Education