Investigating Effectiveness of an Expression Education Support Robot That Nods and Gives Hints

Abstract

In recent years, expression education, which improves the imagination and communication skills, has been attracting attention. It is necessary to provide the appropriate support and evaluation to each expression education student based on their imagination level and individual learning skills. However, it is difficult to match the individual students’ needs in the present educational institutions, where the instructions are typically offered in group settings. In this study, a robot is used as a substitute to the human instructor. Previous studies in the field proposed the use of robots that offer hints to boost the students’ imagination. This paper suggested that the robot had an education-support effect similar to that of a human instructor. However, it is critical to ensure that the learners are interested in the robot in order to achieve positive learning effects. Thus, we performed an experiment to verify the effectiveness of an expression education support robot that nods, as a form of non-verbal communication. The study results indicate the success of the proposed robot in improving the students learning effect and suggest the effectiveness of nodding as well as providing hints.