Abstract
This paper introduces the outline of a creativity education course “machine creation” that has been conducted at the Department of Mechano-Aerospace Engineering, Tokyo Institute of Technology, for 21 years. The course is designed to provide students with extensive opportunities to work with real objects to bridge classroom lectures and hands-on experiences. The students work as a team within a time limitation under budget to create a “street performance robot” which can entertain audience. We assume that students can efficiently learn about a process of product development through this course from planning of the robot to the final presentation of the robot. To evaluate this assumption, we carried out questionnaire survey for the current students and alumni who are currently working as engineers in the real world. The results suggest that this course can provide a valuable experience for students and many alumni agree with our educational methodology.
