Nathan Damweber's first-grade class participated in a first-rate robot workshop today at the Cooper Hewitt, National Design Museum. The kids first saw and discussed several examples of robots in the current National Design Triennial, including Natalie Jerimejenko's impressive feral dog robots (which sniff out toxic waste); WowWee's robotoys (including the raptor pictured here); Hanson Robotics' talking Einstein robot (see the video!); and Joseph Ayers' LoBot lobster robot, whose job it is to seek out underwater mines.
The kids then had their own time in the Cooper-Hewitt studio, where they developed their own robot concepts, deciding what task they wanted to design their robot to perform, identifying the attributes it would therefore need, and then naming and drawing their robot. Before embarking, they did an excercise where a blindfolded child was "programmed" by another child to complete a task. It was hard! The hands-down, most popular concept: a homework 'bot!
The kids then ate their lunch in the Cooper-Hewitt garden and ran around in a Central Park playground before heading back to school for Art and Chinese!
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