Humanoid robots awaken ancient language

Abstract

Through the use of humanoid robots, a rural school in South Australia has embedded the ‘sleeping’ language of the traditional owners of the land (the Narungga people), into the classroom. Maitland Lutheran School,on the Yorke Peninsula in South Australia, demonstrated how pride in Aboriginal culture can be reclaimed using these inclusive and adaptive technologies. This Foundation to Year 9 school of 240 students has a 22% Aboriginal population. Humanoid robots and programming were introduced to students at the school as a way of reconnecting students with their Indigenous culture. Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students worked with virtual and real humanoid robots to develop in parallel both their programming skills and their understanding of the Narungga language and culture. Simultaneously, students and teachers were learning two languages; the coding language required to program the robot and the Narungga language.