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Contents

Summary ............................................................................................................................... 3

Roamer and the Maker Movement ...................................................................................... 3

Roamer Maker Movement Photo Gallery ........................................................................ 3

Hazardous Spherical Objects............................................................................................ 3

Star Wars in Rickmansworth ........................................................................................... 3

Project Full STEAM Ahead ............................................................................................... 3

Arduino, Raspberry Pi and Micro Bit .............................................................................. 4

Roamer in the Curriculum ................................................................................................... 4

Using Educational Research to Transform the Classroom ............................................. 5

Project Development ........................................................................................................ 5

Research Showing the Effectiveness of Activities ............................................................ 5

29 Effective Ways of Using Educational Robots in the Classroom ................................. 5

Roamer Computational Thinking and Coding................................................................. 5

Funnel Activity Design ...................................................................................................... 5

Spin Off Activities ............................................................................................................. 6

Specific Curriculum Packs ................................................................................................ 6

Teacher Training ................................................................................................................... 7

Learning Recall .............................................................................................................................................. 8

How Roamer Activities Improve Recall ....................................................................................................... 8

How to User Roamer – Training Site ............................................................................... 9

Training Courses ............................................................................................................... 9

Activity Design .................................................................................................................... 10

Activity Search ................................................................................................................ 10

Teacher’s Roamer Expertise ........................................................................................... 10

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Free Activity Community ................................................................................................. 11

Roamer and Early Years Teaching ...................................................................................... 11

Activity Behaviours for Early Years ................................................................................. 11

Roamer and Language ........................................................................................................ 12

English as a Second Language and Foreign Language Teaching ............................... 12

Making Roamer Another Language .............................................................................. 12

Special Education ............................................................................................................... 12

GO Archive Articles on Turtle and Classic Roamer in Special Needs ........................... 12

Roamer, Cosmo Bot and the Mayo Clinic ...................................................................... 13

Roamer and Visually Impaired Children. ...................................................................... 13

Roamer and Students with Brain Trauma ..................................................................... 13

Roamer and Issues of Equity, Ethnicity and Culture ........................................................ 13

Finally This is Important .................................................................................................... 13

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Summary

This handbook brings together information about Roamer: its design, features and developments. We

present this information to you through case studies, classroom ideas, research and support. If there’s

something missing or needs clarifying please let us know and we’ll update the manual. Most of the

information is on the Roamer website, which we believe is finally emerging in a way that will help us

develop the Roamer into a global brand. We strongly urge you all to offer your contributions this effort.

Roamer and the Maker Movement

We designed Roamer to be culturally and gender neutral. Students should decide what the robot looks

like. This isn’t simply a dressing up exercise; it is part of engaging the students.

Roamer Maker Movement Photo Gallery This shows how you can transform the way Roamer looks1. Our approach focuses on existing classroom

technology used by teacher and student. You get more success by building on teacher skills not

transforming them.

Hazardous Spherical Objects Roamer designs reflect the technological environment in the school. This Classic Roamer projects shows

a High School with a sophisticated workshop transforming Roamer into a machine that can clean up

dangerous waste.

Star Wars in Rickmansworth This is a picture story of Grade 5 students working with Roamer for the first time. They built the sets for

the robots to act out the stories they turned into a movie.

Project Full STEAM Ahead Prince George’s County Maryland combine Arts with STEM to make STEAM. They ran a pilot of Valiant’s

Robotic Performing Arts project which resulted in their movie the Oxon Hill Middle School Pledge. On

the 12th of April they premiered this at US Congress. The effort in creating a movie brings together maker

skills with artistic, literary, science and technology. It does this in a way that stresses cooperative efforts.

Oxon Hill are now producing another movie.

1 This gallery is continually growing as more pictures are added.

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Arduino, Raspberry Pi and Micro Bit You can add a Control Box to Classic Roamer which allows you to Control sensors and motors, LEDs and

lamps. Roamer now comes with an inbuilt Input and Output port and so you introduce these ideas to

young children without extra modules.

There is a tendency with other suppliers to make their robots simple for young children. They move and

turn. But even 3-year olds engage with sophisticated technology – they turn televisions on and off and

quickly learn how to use a Tablet. They start their technological education by using it. By adding the

control devices you increase the potential of the technology to engage stimulating activities.

Even young children can play with the Roamer Car.

Preschoolers can program the car to turn its lights on and off as easily as they program the robot to move

forward. Add a light sensor and they can program the robot to find dark spaces – the robot behaviour can

automatically turn the lights on. Children learn what technology can do. Learning how to do it comes

later.

Roamer in the Curriculum

In the last 3 decades Valiant has worked with thousands of teachers all over the world. And in that time

we’ve amassed hundreds of activities – in fact we pioneered many that have now become standard.

However, you need more than good activities. We’ve seen many occasions where one teacher has success

with a Roamer task and another fails. Teacher training and the robotic curriculum must go together. We

must also add research into this melting pot. I don’t simply mean evidence to justify what you’ve done,

but the science telling you what to do.

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Using Educational Research to Transform the Classroom I wrote this paper with educators from different countries. It sets out an approach to provide teachers

with access to the research and encourages them to tell researchers of their experiences with Roamer.

This provides a continual improvement of evidence based practice and practice informed evidence.

Project Development Valiant develop their classroom materials based on experience and research of technology, education,

psychology and a wide variety of relevant topics. The peer reviewed research paper Robotic Performing

Arts Project preceded the activity development. It provides a framework for design and implementing

Roamer in school.

Research Showing the Effectiveness of Activities The Spacecraft Rescue Activity shows how you can adapt projects to different age groups and abilities.

We ran the project with a mathematically gifted class of 17-year old students. We also ran it with some 13-

year old students. Then Stephie Holmquist received her doctorate based on a study of the project in an

Elementary School. This shows the adaptability of Roamer to educational demands. More importantly,

this ability supports effective differentiation.

29 Effective Ways of Using Educational Robots in the Classroom The peer reviewed paper Educational Robotic Application Principles2 provide a way of understanding and

evaluating educational robots. In this peer review paper I elaborate one of these, the pedagogical

principles demonstrating the ideas with 29 activity examples.

Roamer Computational Thinking and Coding This presentation and peer reviewed paper written by myself and Dr. John Woollard, shows how Roamer

has a long history of Computational Thinking. Many Roamer activities have a proven track record as the

presentation shows by an in depth analysis of two activities. It shows how computational thinking is

intrinsic to Roamer work and answers questions like “Does computational thinking involve more than

coding?”

The K1 Coding pack shows our approach to curriculum materials. We introduce both ideas and

programming instructions through activities. You will notice the package uses a spiral curriculum. You

start with an idea and then come back to it later. This reinforces and deepens student understanding.

Funnel Activity Design We also design the materials using a funnel method. We introduce an idea, consolidate it, present it in a

different context then set a challenge that uses it. This is an effective way of dealing with classrooms of

mixed ability. We see this in the math activity below. By combining Roamer’s movement with the

number line representation of natural counting numbers we give students a way to visually, spatially and

kinaesthetically understand arithmetic. This is a powerful approach when introducing negative number

math.

2 This paper was delivered as a Keynote Presentation. The Principles of Educational Robotics Applications (ERA): A framework for

understanding and developing educational robots and their activities. Catlin, D. and Blamires, M. Paris : Proceedings of

Constructionism 2010, 2010. Constructionism 2010.

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This set of 4 cards helps students develop a deeper understanding of subtraction.

The activity demonstrates the commutative laws. The activity shows that unlike addition subtraction is

not commutative3. There’s no need for teachers to use the term, but the students must understand the

rule.

Buried in the 4th worksheet is the idea of mathematical equivalence. If the two chosen cards are 3 and 8

then 3<5<8 the delivery order matters. If the chosen numbers are 7 and 9 then 5<7<9 then the delivery

order does not matter. Many young children can work this out. They would not use the mathematical

notation and the teacher would not use the mathematical jargon. BUT, the activity is consolidating their

understanding of arithmetic and at the same time giving them an experience which will act as prior

knowledge when they study mathematical equivalence in later years. This is the nature of much work

with Roamer: it provides students with experience you can build on.

Spin Off Activities Roamer tasks create the opportunity to add meaning to other work. Students wrote this GO Article as

part of a language arts assignment, but inspired by Roamer.

Specific Curriculum Packs We have a vast number of activities and projects which we issue under the Creative Commons Licence.

Schools can get these from the activity library. However, we also can offer courses like the Computing

Pack. For example:

3 4 + 3 is the same as 3 + 4 (it is commutative) whereas 4 – 3 is not the same as 3 – 4 (it is not commutative).

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1. Elementary School Scheme of Work includes Roamer and non-Roamer Work.

2. Shanghai Roamer Curriculum – developed in San Diego for schools in Shanghai, China.

3. Math and Science Curriculum for Elementary schools developed by Mike Doyle from the BOCES

Alleghany School District in New York State and aligned to the old NY Standards4.

4. Angry Birds Coding Curriculum – currently being piloted in Minneapolis

5. Denise Graham research project. Denise is a South London teacher and educational consultant,

she put together a pack of materials for her Ma at Greenwich University.

We can work with people to organise the materials to meet their needs.

Teacher Training

The diagrams illustrate the status of teachers and the training task.

The US Department of Education had a structure of Master, Leader and novice teachers. This

classification can also apply to the teacher’s expertise with Roamer. The ladder of competence represents

the journey from knowing nothing to internalised knowledge. The training problem is how to get people

into the red quadrant and from Stage 1 to Stage 4 on the training ladder.

4 I appreciate the politics around TEKS and Common Core. Aligning Roamer activities to Standards is a bureaucratic effort. The whole world teaches more or less the same subjects, for example, everyone teaches Pythagoras. Roamer is about helping teachers find better ways to engage children studying and thinking about ideas everyone learns.

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Learning Recall The charts below represent typical recall following training sessions5 and how follow up can dramatically improve recall.

Adapted from Tony Buzan6 Use Your Head

Also adapted from Buzan: The effect of follow up sessions.

How Roamer Activities Improve Recall

Buzan shows with appropriate follow through trainees can retain their learning and can exceed it - when

their mastery and creativity take over they add to the knowledge base.

Roamer activities and the How to Use Roamer support site integrate to provide zero cost follow up.

5 The data represents underlying trends. 6 Buzan, Tony. Use Your Head. London : BBC Worldwide Ltd., 2000.

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Each Activity integrates with the support and training materials.

How to User Roamer – Training Site The training site provides all the technical details needed to use Roamer. This is done in small bits that

take one or two minutes to read7. How to manage a lesson is an important part of using Roamer. Our

research shows that Assessment for Learning (AfL) methods work best. AfL is a codification of good

teaching practice. We’ve gathered a collection of support and training materials the teachers might find

useful to refresh on improve these skills.

The site is designed to provide:

Just in Time

On the Job Training

Children learn by doing. So do we. The pop ups and links provide teachers with what they need to do an

activity when they’re doing it.

Training Courses These modules offer the basis of a training course. If teachers want an organised approach they can

explore the training site at their leisure or they can use them to train other staff members.

7 Some of the materials give in-depth training.

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Activity Design

We’ve made extensive studies of what people want from an activity and what other people offer. There’s

no agreement, just a diverse wish list. We therefore provide a lot of information. Most teachers will not

want all of it. Consequently, the challenge was to design a way of presenting information that the teachers

find useful, but accessible in a user friendly way.

1. There’s a lot of information with an activity – BUT they’re not prescriptive the information is

there to inspire, guide, support and save the teacher work.

2. It’s important the materials reflect teacher’s experience and practice therefore it requires a

community to create them.

3. It’s vital that the work incorporates relevant research.

Activity Search8

You can make an activity search on any combination of the following.

1. Age group

2. Subject

3. Topic

4. Teacher’s Roamer expertise

5. Availability (free, commercial, example)

6. Duration (Part lesson, lesson, mini project, project)

7. Organisation (Whole class, group, individual)

Teacher’s Roamer Expertise We classify activities according to the teacher’s experience with the technology.

Teachers new to Roamer.

Teachers with good experience using in the classroom.

Expert users. A lot experience with the product.

Note: This classification has nothing to do with the ability to teach – it’s about their mastery of the

technology.

1. It does not classify the quality of the activity.

2. Excellent activities exist in all categories.

3. A green teacher can do a red activity as long as they’re prepared for the steep learning curve.

8 This video is obsolete. We’re removing the country selection which simplifies the creation of the activities and the search process. Instead of searching for Grade you search for age groups. The curriculum links is still based on local requirements, but they’re only created by the community.

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Free Activity Community We’ve gathered hundreds of activities over the last 3 decades. The work required to catalogues these with

the information outlined is huge. Our current strategy is to load up basics and work with the teaching

community to provide the extra information. Friends of Roamer gives teachers a way to give us their data.

Roamer and Early Years Teaching

Early Years Activities form a large part of our Archives. Roamer for the Under Fives provides a set of

activities in a downloadable booklet format.

Sentence Games form part of the Roamer Literacy Archive we are adding to the Library.

Activity Behaviours for Early Years You can change the behaviour and the keypad graphic. We are ready to capitalise on these and other

features in developing new ways of using Roamer with younger children. This includes some radically

new technology we hope to launch next academic year. Because we

designed Roamer knowing what activities had worked over the years, and

deep understanding of the potential of robots we built into the robot

features which other robots do not have. Whereas there is nothing other

robots do that Roamer cannot do.

In the Itsy Bitsy Spider activity the children have to program the robot to

sing the rhyme in the right order.

Itsy Bitsy (UK Incy Wincy) Spider

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Roamer and Language

Most educational robotics focus on Turtle Graphics (math) or building robots9. However, the ability to

engage children with language is huge. In the Robotic Performing Arts project we explore the connection

between robots and storytelling. Roamer is a natural for the current language arts interest in

instructional writing and reading.

English as a Second Language and Foreign Language Teaching Logo researchers did some pioneering work in this area. The late Wally Feurzeig[2] gave me a lot of his

research papers before he passed on[3]. No one has developed these ideas. We constructed Roamer to

take advantage of this.

Work done in Canberra, Australia with children in one class speaking as many as 14 different languages

showed the potential.

So far we have not had the opportunity to explore this potential in depth. Maggie Morrissey did some

good preliminary work in Moscow using Roamer. She has done a lot more and is in the process of

writing this up. You can get a brief glimpse of how this ties together in Playing Turtle in Moscow and

Roamer and English as a Second Language.

Making Roamer Another Language To make Roamer speak another language we need a set of voice files for the Prompts and Help

Files. See Creating Foreign Language Roamers

Special Education

The current Roamer was developed under the project title of SEROTA (Special Educational Robotic

Teaching Aid). The inspiration for the idea came from research with practicing Special Education

Teachers work for a Masters in the subject. This was organised by Mike Blamires at Canterbury Christ

Church University. I met Mike 30 years ago. He was special education advisor for the London Borough

of Redbridge. That first meeting I found him trying to adapt a toy so special children could use it. That’s

the rule. The Masters teachers all found ways of using Classic Roamer, but they needed to adapt it.

So I had the idea of making a robot that we could quickly configure into a device to meet our needs. A

little more research showed this idea could also have main stream education advantages.

GO Archive Articles on Turtle and Classic Roamer in Special Needs I am currently posting some of the GO Archive material into the current blog. Follow the link and then

select the Special Needs Category on the right.

9 Like all general statements there are exceptions to these. [2] Wally led the project which involved Papert and the development of Logo and educational robots. [3] Goldenberg, E Paul and Feurzeig, Wallace. Exploring Language with Logo. Cambridge, Ma : MIT Press, 1987.

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Roamer, Cosmo Bot and the Mayo Clinic During the development of the latest Roamer we worked with Anthrotronix in Maryland and the Mayo

Clinic Minnesota. Anthrotronix built a 3D Printed structure on the top of Roamer can called it Cosmo

Bot. Working with Mayo Clinic they worked with students with various problems.

Development of an Interactive Upper Extremity Gestural Robotic Feedback System: From Bench to

Reality Describes the work with Cosmo Bot and Roamer.

See controlling Roamer with the interactive glove.

See Mayo Clinic Cosmo Bot and Autism.

Roamer and Visually Impaired Children. You will see from the GO Articles Classic Roamer had a long history of working with partially sighted

students. Roamer can engage them more. We’ve recently received some work from Spain which

includes a Braille Keypad and several activities. We will post this in GO in the next few weeks.

Roamer and Students with Brain Trauma This is the paper from Paris reports on the use Classic Roamer to help students injured in car accidents.

Roamer and Issues of Equity, Ethnicity and Culture

Roamer is deliberately designed as a simple androgynous shape in a neutral colour. Roamer does not do

things to students. Students do things to the robot. They can use it to express themselves and their

cultural and community concerns. The following links to some of our work.

1. Squaxin Native American Project – Seattle

2. Using Educational Robots as a Tool of Cultural Expression – Prague

3. Using Educational Robots to Enhance the Performance of Minor Students – Lake La Garda Italy

4. Roamer in Uganda

a. Roamer Becomes a Bee

b. Kafuro School Gets Roamers

Finally This is Important

Roamer is designed to survive spills and tumbles of a classrooms life. We have Classic Roamers still

working in classrooms after 20 years.

Roamer Stars in Rough and Tough