IRobot: Teaching the Basics of Artificial Intelligence in High Schools

Abstract

Profound knowledge about Artificial Intelligence (AI) will become increasingly important for careers in science and engineering. Therefore an innovative educational project teaching fundamental concepts of AI at high school level will be presented in this paper. We developed an AI-course covering major topics (problem solving, search, planning, graphs, datastructures, automata, agent systems, machine learning) which comprises both theoretical and hands-on components. A pilot project was conducted and empirically evaluated. Results of the evaluation show that the participating pupils have become familiar with those concepts and the various topics addressed. Results and lessons learned from this project form the basis for further projects in different schools which intend to integrate AI in future secondary science education.

A Driving License for Intelligent Systems

“…In this paper we presented a 3-year project (launched in 2017) focusing on developing and implementing an extensive, professional, standardized training and certification system for Artificial Intelligence (AI). Based on already implemented and evaluated pilot projects (Kandlhofer et al 2016;Burgsteiner, Kandlhofer, and Steinbauer 2016) and following the concept of the well-known ICDL (Csapo 2002) the goal is to establish an internationally accepted and recognized Driving License for Intelligent Systems (training and certifying teachers/mentors as well as students in basic and advanced AI topics). The upcoming steps in 2018 and 2019 are the implementation of teacher trainings (train-thetrainer) and certifications based on the AI training curricula developed in the first phase of the project.…”

“…The trainings for trainers and trainees deal with major AI topics (as described in (Russell and Norvig 2009)), having a close connection with current AI research. The following list provides an overview of topics covered (complexity and extent of contents vary depending on beginner/advanced training) (Burgsteiner, Kandlhofer, and Steinbauer 2016):…”

“…It is important that the level and quality of the training is sufficiently advanced so that it will be recognized and accepted by educational institutions and the industry. The project is based on several pilot projects conducted and evaluated in previous years focusing on familiarizing different age groups with fundamental topics of AI (Kandlhofer et al 2016;Burgsteiner, Kandlhofer, and Steinbauer 2016). The idea of an "AI driving license" is inspired by the well-established International Computer Driving Licence (ICDL) 2 which tests and certifies people's skills necessary to use common computer applications (e.g.…”

Towards an AI-Infused Interdisciplinary Curriculum for Middle-Grade Classrooms

“…While many effective AI curricula have been made for K-12 [Estevez, Garate, and Graña 2019;Sabuncuoglu 2020;Williams et al 2019], few of them go beyond the concepts involved in machine learning. Examples of such curricula for high-school students are mentioned in [Burgsteiner, Kandlhofer, and Steinbauer 2016;Kandlhofer et al 2019]. In this work, we present a curricular module that teaches a core AI idea, search, with the goal of expanding our curriculum to encompass other crucial AI ideas and techniques that are through students' engagement with authentic problem-solving scenarios.…”

ARTY: Fueling Creativity through Art, Robotics and Technology for Youth

“…A number of them use robotics as a means to teach various topics in STEM as well as STEAM, which adds an art component to the STEM endeavor. (Burgsteiner, Kandlhofer, and Steinbauer 2016) created a program teaching several aspects of AI to high school students. The program was two hours every week over seven weeks and involved nine students.…”