Introducing computer programming to secondary school students using mobile robots

Abstract

This paper reports results of an action research conducted in an outreach program aimed at introducing secondary school students to the exciting world of computer programming. The key challenges were to introduce programming and problem solving session that can be done in a very short time (within 1 to 2 hours) and in a fun way. This was achieved by using a physical mobile robot called RoboKar to engage students with the problem solving activities involving programming. From the entry and exit surveys, and facilitators' observations, it can be concluded that the robot platform and the outreach program were able to introduce and spark interest in learning programming among the school students.