Korean Students Learning English by Robot

Learning English by robot? It's happening, in Daegu.

The South Korean city boasts a full 21 elementary schools now featuring egg-shaped robots that teach by reading and dancing to music. (The machines can wheel themselves around the room, after all.)

The meter-high robots, numbering 29 in all, have an avatar for a face, which reflects the facial expressions of the people giving the instructions — teachers in the Philippines! It is indeed a few degrees of separation from one teacher, one classroom.

It's all part of a pilot program, infused by $1.37 million from the national government, to address a shortage of teachers in rural areas. Proponents say that if the trial is successful, then the robots will be rolled out (literally) to classrooms across the country.

Oddly enough, reports are that students too shy to interact with human teachers are responding to the voice and activity of the robots.

The robots also play alphabet games and sing songs. It's all part of the learn-English program.

The teachers, operating remotely, can see what's going on in the classroom, so it's not like they're totally removed from the action. Still, they really are removed from the classroom. If a student misbehaves, will that student mind a robot-teacher? If the student gets physical and tips the robot over, what happens to the rest of the class? Presumably, the remote-teachers would be able to alert the other teachers in the Korean school and/or the principal, who would sort things out. Still, one can't help thinking that this will work only as long as students are not unruly.

Then there's the cost issue. each of these robots costs 10 million won (nearly $9,000). That's a lot less than the cost of maintaining a teacher, even if you factor only salary, sick leave, insurance, and severance into only a one-year calculation. But does it create the same sort of encouraging learning environment that students having human teachers would get? Depends on what you're used to or what you'll tolerate. If learning is the main goal, then maybe these robots are just the ticket, especially since they're a sort of hybrid in that they feature remote interaction with human teachers. Still, it might take more than a bit of getting used to for the students to truly appreciate "I, Robot, am your teacher." Maybe it's a generational thing.