Abstract
Discrete mathematics covers the field of graph theory, which solves various problems in graphs using algorithms, such as coloring graphs. Part of graph theory is focused on algorithms that solve the passage through mazes and labyrinths. This paper presents a study conducted as part of a university course focused on graph theory. The course addressed the problem of high student failure in the mazes and labyrinths chapter. Students’ theoretical knowledge and practical skills in solving algorithms in the maze were low. Therefore, the use of educational robots and their involvement in the teaching of subjects in part focused on mazes and labyrinths. This study shows an easy passage through the individual areas of teaching the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) concept. In this article, we describe the research survey and focus on the description and examples of teaching in a university course. Part of the work is the introduction of an easy transition from the theoretical solution of algorithms to their practical implementation on a real autonomous robot. The theoretical part of the course introduced the issues of graph theory and basic algorithms for solving the passage through the labyrinth. The contribution of this study is a change in the approach to teaching graph theory and a greater interconnection of individual areas of STEM to achieve better learning outcomes for science students.
Highlights
This paper focuses on a new concept for teaching graph theory using educational robots, so it is a connection of the individual parts of the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) concept
The results revealed that the slowest algorithm was the random mouse, which uses the completely random movement of the robot in the maze
In this study, we focused on a new concept of teaching graph theory using educational robots
Summary
This paper focuses on a new concept for teaching graph theory using educational robots, so it is a connection of the individual parts of the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) concept. This article describes research conducted when teaching graph theory at a university and provides a practical solution to a selected part of the course focused on solving a passage through a maze. As part of the educational course for theoretical lectures, they attended practical seminars where students learned to apply the acquired theoretical knowledge to examples. Students did not have the opportunity to transfer theoretical knowledge to solve real problems in life. In this case, we present a change in a practical seminar that involved educational robots in the teaching of graph theory. We see considerable potential for their use and fulfilment of the STEM concepts
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