Thymio II is a small robot developed for education. It aims at offering a wide public the possibility to understand the basics of robotics and programming. To achieve this, it aims at being appealing to a large age range and serve as a medium for several types of activities. In this study, we tested it in five different workshops of the EPFL Robotics Festival with various activities. The workshops target different age groups and the participants can control the robot via different means: builtin buttons, graphical programming and text programming. At the end of the activities, participants were asked to fill a short survey to give their impressions about the robot, their appreciation of the tasks and their motivations to take part. We could show through this feedback that Thymio II appeals to young children as much as to teenagers, to both girls and boys, and allows them to have fun and learn new things.

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We implemented single-session workshops using the Thymio-II-a small, self-contained robot designed for young students, and VPL-a graphical software development environment based upon event handling. Our goal was to investigate if the students could learn this core computer science concept while enjoying themselves in the robotics context. A visual questionnaire was developed based upon the combined Bloom and SOLO taxonomies, although it proved difficult to construct a questionnaire appropriate for young students. We found that-despite the short duration of the workshop-all but the youngest students achieved the cognitive level of Unistructural Understanding, while some students achieved higher levels of Unistructural Applying and Multistructural Understanding and Applying.

Technology is playing an increasing role in our society. Therefore it becomes important to educate the general public, and young generations in particular, about the most common technologies. In this context, robots are excellent education tools, for many reasons: (i) robots are fascinating and attract the attention of all population classes, (ii) because they move and react to their environment, robots are perceived as close to living beings, which make people attracted and attached to them, (iii) robots are multidisciplinary systems and can illustrate technological principles in electronics, mechanics, computer and communication sciences, and (iv) robots have many applications fields: medical, industrial, agricultural, safety ... While several robots exist on the market and are used for education, entertainment or both, none fits with the dream educational tool: promoting creativity and learning, entertaining, cheap and powerful. We addressed this goal by developing the Thymio robot and distributing it during workshops over two years. This paper describes the design principles of the robot, the educational context, and the analysis made with 65 parents after two years of use. We conclude the paper by outlining the specifications of a new form of educational robot.