Teaching With the Nao Robot: Teacher - Users’ Attitudes

The proposed paper critically explores the implications of digital educational tools on teaching processes rather than on learning processes by analysing interviews with teachers who have used the NAO robot in three schools near Bologna, within the European project EDUROB (2016-2018). The use of this instrument is considered to be affected by the whole socio-technical milieu (the “classrooms”), which includes cultural assumptions about digital artefacts. Hence, our hypothesis is that teachers play a key role in transmitting pre-assumed beliefs and concerns about technology to students, especially if training courses for all the teacher-users are not guaranteed. As an example of possible critical consequences from a lack of training, the authors underline “non-expert” teachers’ tendency to use the NAO robot as an assistant in doing their job. In these cases, teachers unintentionally convey to students interpretations of this technology that are likely to be far from the expected ones. Here, the role of the robot ranges from a tool for enhancing education to an “entertainer”.