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Tel-Aviv University | School of Education | satec | ktl

Early development of

technological/engineering stance by

Kindergarten children

Children perceptions of artifacts with

adaptive behaviour

David Mioduser & Asi Kuperman

PATT 25 & CRIPT 8 - London, July 1-5

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On studying the encounter between

children and the artificial world:

‘curricular perspective’:

technological [literacy, content

knowledge, PCK, curricular

differentiation/integration, STEM, ...]

‘with the child in mind’

cognitive perspective:

technological/engineering/design

‘stance’

‘Design Stance’ [Dennett, 1987]

‘Human intelligence and Technology

[Sternberg; Cole and Derry, 2002]

‘Intuitive engineering’ [Pinker, 2002]

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Rationale: perspectives and definitions

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‘Intuitive engineering’ - [Pinker, 2002]

“the world is an heterogeneous place, and we are equipped with different kinds of intuitions and logics, each appropriate to one department of reality ... intuitive physics ... intuitive biology ... spatial sense ... number sense ... mental database and logics ... language ... [and]... intuitive engineering - which we use to understand artifacts - [objects] with a purpose, designed by a person to achieve a goal”

design stance [Dennett, 1987]

“an abstract explanatory schema that captures the relationship between features of an entity (e.g. its material, shape and activities) in terms of a coherent organizing notion: the purpose for which its designer created it”

what is innate ? what develops? when "it" develops? what conditions support "its" development [education question]

Rationale: perspectives and definitions

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not apples but artificial minds

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A robot as many microprocessor-based artifacts

in our everyday environment, is a unique

artifact: it is characterized by purposeful

functioning and autonomous decision-making (it

'behaves'?), programmability and knowledge

accumulation capabilities (it 'learns'?), and

adaptive behavior (it 'makes decisions'?)

This new category of creatures affects the

traditional and intuitive distinctions between

the alive and not-alive, animate and inanimate,

human-operated and autonomous.

natural & artificial minds

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artificial minds

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Question 1:

What are kindergarten children's

perceptions of programmable adaptive

artifacts in terms of the stance adopted (i.e.,

engineering vs. psychological)?

Question 2:

Do these perceptions vary as a function of

the complexity of the task and involvement

in programming the artifact's behaviour?

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research questions

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Participants: 10 children, 5 boys and 5 girls, age

ranging from 5:4 years to 6:3 years, arbitrarily

chosen from a group of 25 children attending a

kindergarten of average socio-economic status in

the central region in Israel.

Instruments: the robotic environment

(programming interface and physical robot) and a

progression of tasks of increasing complexity.

Procedure: Data collection lasted two months. All

sessions and interviews took place in the

kindergarten's robotics corner and were

videotaped.

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method

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setting

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Explanations Definition Examples of children's explanations

Use of anthropomorphic language

Robot's behaviour is explained in terms of intentions, volition, feelings and human-like actions

"… He sees that it is the sea and decides to turn…""… If he sees a person then he has to tell him…"

Use of technological language

Robot's behaviour is explained in terms of its components' functions, mechanisms, and formal decision-making rules

"… we simply wrote [programmed], when he gets to the black area he stops and when in the white area turns back…""… and if one [sensor] sees white and the other sees black then [turn] left…"

Question 1: explanatory stance

Explanatory language

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Statements

Anthropomorphic language

Technological language

N=684 107 (16 %) 577 (84 %)

Predominance of the technological/engineering

stanceExample of typical (expected in age level) use of

anthropomorphic language:

"He's walking only on the white area because it feels

warm … he wears a hat and he knows that he is wearing

the hat"Functional use of anthropomorphic language when

children felt that is perfectly natural to use human-

related terms for an explanation, even if they are

explicitly aware that they report about an artifact's

behaviour

Question 1: explanatory stance

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Question 2: explanatory stance by activity or task

ActivityAnthropomorphic language

Technological language

Observation (N=107)

54 (50 %) 53 (50 %)

Construction (N=577)

194 (34 %) 383 (66 %)

Task complexityAnthropomorphic language

Technological language

One rule (N=197)

76 (39 %) 121 (61 %)

Rule+routine (N=204)

79 (39 %) 125 (61 %)

Two rules (N=283)

93 (33 %) 190 (67 %)

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Question 2: explanatory stance by activity and task

Task complexity

ActivityAnthropomorphic language

Technological language

One rule (N=197)

Observer (N=44) 21 (48 %) 23 (52 %)

Constructor (N=153)

55 (36 %) 98 (64 %)

Rule+routine (N=204)

Observer (N=41) 19 (46 %) 22 (54 %)

Constructor (N=163)

60 (37 %) 103 (63 %)

Two rules (N=283)

Observer (N=22) 14 (64 %) 8 (36 %)

Constructor (N=261)

79 (30 %) 182 (70 %)

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A first glance on the data unveils several facts:

The number of statements increased with the complexity of the tasks

In all tasks, about two thirds of the statements were phrased using technological language

Most of these statements were generated by the constructors, who generated five times more statements than the observers

In all tasks, the percentage of observers' statements using anthropomorphic or technological language was similar (~50%), while two thirds of the constructors' statements were phrased using technological language

With the increase in tasks' complexity, the use of anthropomorphic language by the observers increased and by the constructors decreased. At the same time the use of technological language by the constructors remained at constant level - about two thirds of the statements

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Question 2: explanatory stance by activity and task

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Technological language is needed for addressing tasks of increasing complexity, both for understanding and explaining the artifacts behaviour and more evidently for programming it

While approaching the "breed" of behaving and adaptive artifacts children very rapidly adopt appropriate (even if not accurate or correct) language and explanatory approach.

In contrast with previous findings, which reported on kindergarten-age children's tendency to adopt animistic and psychological perspectives, we have observed that the engagement in constructing the anthropomorphic artifacts' behaviour promoted the use of technological language and indicated the early development of the engineering stance

Children's involvement in tasks integrating symbolic (i.e., working with the iconic interface) and physical (i.e., manipulating and observing a real artifact) activities supports their thinking and acting beyond the expected at this age level ("concrete-abstractions").

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[preliminary] Discussion

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Research-based:

Definition of contents: foci, scope and pace

Pedagogical design of developmentally appropriate learning opportunities, learning materials and learning environments

Formalization of developmentally appropriate pedagogical solutions

Design of teacher formation plans and contents

Design of comprehensive implementation plans: sustainability, transferability and scalability prospects

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Implications and future work

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Tel-Aviv University | School of Education | satec | ktl

Thank you !!!David Mioduser & Asi Kuperman