Enhancing Teacher-Students’ Digital Competence with Educational Robots

Abstract

The digital competence of an average teacher is still behind the level needed for teaching in technology-rich classrooms. The teacher-students need skills and knowledge for enhancing their lesson plans and activities with technology. Educational robots can be used to improve teacher-students’ digital competence to support their problem solving, communication, creativity, collaboration, and critical thinking skills. Together with STEAM kits, educational robots provide good opportunities to teach subjects like mathematics, chemistry, biology, and physics. The aim of this case study is to find if a robot-enhanced training course encourages development of teachers-students’ digital competence, and which educational robots or STEAM kits do teacher-students prefer to use in learning activities. We used European Digital Competence Framework for Educators to assess teacher-students’ competence in four areas (digital resources, teaching and learning, empowering learners, facilitating learners’ digital competence) before and after a robot-enhanced training course. Our results indicate that activities with educational robots (hands-on experiments and designing innovative lesson plans) supported and developed teacher-students’ digital competence. As a conclusion we recommend using educational robots or other STEAM kits when developing teachers’ digital competence.