Play, Dreams and Imitation in Robota

Abstract

Imitation, play and dreams are as many means for the child to develop her/his understanding of the world and of its social rules. What if we were to have a robot we could play with? What if we could through play and daily interactions, as we do with our children, be a m odel for it and teach it (what?) to be human-like? This chapter describes the Robota dolls, a family of small humanoid robots, which can interact with the user in many ways, imitating gestures, learning how to dance and learning how to speak.