Robotic Teaching Assistants Make Learning Fun in Washington Classroom
Very few teachers have teaching assistants who don’t ask for lunch breaks. Most won’t work for free either. Ted Gamble, a 3rd grade teacher at Meredith Hill Elementary School in Auburn, Washington, may have the most unique aides in his class.
They don’t ask for lunch breaks because they don’t eat or breathe.
No need to interview and hire these teaching assistants. Mr. Gamble has built his own. Meet the THX family, Silver Rocket and Ion Dauphin. They assist in the classroom by taking attendance, reading stories, giving spelling and math tests, making announcements and reminding students of important events. They also make cool sound effects and play music when prompted.
The robots can get a little bossy at times, but the students don’t mind.
Mr. Gamble designed and built the robots with help from laptops donated by Pixar, The Seattle Times, Washington State and Warehouser.
All of the robots have names and special talents, although Mr. Gamble says they aren’t robots in the true sense. They are constructed from materials and made to look like robots. The faux robots have speakers built into them that are connected to laptops running sound effects,
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