A Robot In Every Korean Kindergarten By 2013? 136
kkleiner writes "Elementary school children in Korea in the cities of Masan and Daegu are among the first to be exposed to EngKey, a robotic teacher. The arrival of EngKey to Masan and Daegu is just a small step in the mechanization of Korean classrooms: the Education Ministry wants all 8400 kindergartens in the nation to have robotic instructors by the end of 2013. Plans are already under way to place 830 bots in preschools by year's end. EngKey can hold scripted conversations with students to help them improve their language skills, or a modified version can act as a telepresence tool to allow distant teachers to interact with children."
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:5, Insightful)
What's destructive/violent about disassembling something to learn how it works? Oddly enough it's what I did as a child, and now as an adult (this skill is particularly valuable in the security industry for finding and fixing vulnerabilities). As for the target practice comment I look forward to teaching my kids how to throw accurately (as an adult I can underhand lob a bag of garbage a good 20 feet into the trash can outside, saving me about half of the walk which is especially practical in a Canadian winter).
Please don't teach children that it is wrong to be curious (e.g. disassembling things). We need people who actually care about how stuff works (hint: you're using a computer. not invented by the timid and afraid to break things)
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:3, Insightful)
You are missing the point.
There is nothing wrong with using computers and robots to educate kids on a one by one basis. They are priceless to that regard. The same 8 year old I referred to is spending up to an hour a day with things like Mathletics, Spellodrome and educational multimedia. That however is one to one.
The idea to put a robot into the dominant position in a human social environment which is a classroom is beyond idiotic. A teacher is not just an explainer and illustrator. A teacher is an example to the students. It is the "leader of the pack" and any teacher not ready to assume that position should never try to cross the classroom door. Even if a robot manages to assume that position, which I doubt, I really do not want to be anywhere near the kids coming out of that classroom.
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:1, Insightful)
The problem is not really in the school. It start out when the children first ask their parents why the sky is blue or where babies come from.
I have yet to see a single parent handle a situation like that gracefully. Most children stop asking questions before they reach first grade.
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:5, Insightful)
So what, punish (and put on pills if that does not work) every child which has a curiosity how things work? Punish (and put on pills if that does not work) every child that would question the authority of an adult.
Wonderful idea. That has been tried by the way and is the standard tactics of lazy and incompetent teachers especially in some countries. The ballpark figures for the UK are that more than 25% of children with special statements have them for exactly that reason - their teacher at some point was too lazy and incompetent to enforce authority and went for the easy way out (that was on the BBC and a few major newspapers by the way, I am not inventing that number)
The result of such laziness is also well known - it is well known which countries end up exporting intellectual labour or importing brains.
No thanks, I would rather have my 2 and a half year old disassembling toys and picking locks (which she does) and my 8 year old try his luck in an authority contest with any new teacher he has. By the way he won in reception and year one vs both teacher and headmaster leading to the point where the incompetent dolts in those schools trying to stitch him with a statement. He has lost the contest with every teacher since in his new school. Lots of headache for me, but hey, that is what children are for - to give parents a headache once in a while.
And going back to the original topic - I cannot see anyone growing up while allowed to question authority and tinker with things not making a mockery of a robot teacher. That may work only in a society which has considerably harder concepts of seniority and authority than EU/US.
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:1, Insightful)
You are an idiot. He was merely demonstrating how incredibly well-behaved South Korean kids are. Specifically them -- not 'nonwhites'. Any racism in arivanov's post has been introduced by YOU.
In contrast, American kids tend to be violent and destructive. I'd much rather live in South Korea than America, any day. (That said, I think it's a good thing to try to find out how things work -- in my youth I often destroyed stuff in exactly this way!)
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:1, Insightful)
How would a robot successfully discipline your child?
How would a human teatcher successfully discipline your child?
It is not the teachers job to discipline your child. You should have made sure that the child behaves before you leave it to others.
You should be happy that your children have not been thrown out of school.
What about TV? (Score:3, Insightful)
If a particular culture wishes to subject their offspring to this kind of learning experience, so be it
As opposed to a culture that subjects their offspring to insufficiently trained, badly paid, undermotivated human teachers? And after school they sit in front of the TV?
Excuse me? (Score:2, Insightful)
EngKey can hold scripted conversations with students to help them improve their language skills
Scripted conversations are better compared to normal human conversations in helping young children develop language skills? What a joke.
Typical Korea (Score:3, Insightful)
in three to five years, Engkey will mature enough to replace native speakers.
This is another one of Korea's stupid ideas to save a quick buck. At one point they tried to have Korean teachers replace the foreign teachers saying that they could do the job just as well. Obviously, it didn't work. Not only because they have poor hiring standards across the board (cheapest = best) but also because it's very difficult to teach a language without native speaking knowledge.
Robots teaching kids? Stupid and destined to fail.
Re:This can happen only in Korea (Score:3, Insightful)
Schools in South-Korea are essentially institutions that destroy creativity by design - they are designed to produce robotic-like work drones for huge South-Korean conglomerates. ... ...a great documentary about the issue on BBC about a year ago, where they showed that average day, and noted that even prime minister of the time spoke of this system as something bad, and something they want to change.
So if the question is "how do you not produce robot children", the answer is "install robot teachers"?