A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Setting <s> T w o University of Chicago doctoral students in education, Anania (1982, 1983) and Burke (1984), completed dissertations in which they compared student learning under the following three conditions of instruction: 1. Conventional. Students learn the subject matter in a class with about 30 students per teacher. Tests are given periodically for marking the students. 2. Mastery Learning. Students learn the subject matter in a class with about 30 students per teacher. The instruction is the same as in the conventional class (usually with the same teacher). Formative tests (the same tests used with the conventional group) are given for feedback followed by corrective procedures and parallel formative tests to determine the extent to which the students have mastered the subject matter. 3. Tutoring. Students learn the subject matter with a good tutor for each student (or for two or three students simultaneously). This tutoring instruction is followed periodically by formative tests, feedback-corrective procedures, and parallel formative tests as in the mastery learning classes. It should be pointed out that the need for corrective work under tutoring is very small. <s> BIB001 </s> A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Setting <s> In this study, the researchers attempted to extend the concept of learning companions from the virtual world to the real physical environment and made a breakthrough in technique development of tangible learning robots. The aim of this study was to explore an innovative way by combining the speech recognition technology with educational robots in the hope that the state-of-the-art technology could provide learners with more opportunities of bi-directional language learning in the English class settings. The quasi-experimental design was adopted in this study and a total of 63 Taiwanese students in the fifth grade participated in the experiment. The results reveal that using the tangible learning companions in learning had positive effects on learners' learning motivation, confidence and engagement especially for the lower-achievement learners. Two learning methods were identified in the study, co-discovery and peer tutoring method. The co-discovery method enhanced the lower-achievement learners' learning involvement and their English speaking ability. Students perceived the tangible learning robots as friendly learning toys or ever like a patient instructor for practicing English conversation. Both English instructor and students agreed that uses of the tangible learning companions effectively improved the class atmosphere, and raised their and positive attitude toward learning English. <s> BIB002 </s> A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Setting <s> In education research, there is a widely-cited result called “Bloom’s two sigma” that characterizes the differences in learning outcomes between students who receive one-on-one tutoring and those who receive traditional classroom instruction [1]. Tutored students scored in the 95th percentile, or two sigmas above the mean, on average, compared to students who received traditional classroom instruction. In human-robot interaction research, however, there is relatively little work exploring the potential benefits of personalizing a robot’s actions to an individual’s strengths and weaknesses. In this study, participants solved grid-based logic puzzles with the help of a personalized or non-personalized robot tutor. Participants’ puzzle solving times were compared between two non-personalized control conditions and two personalized conditions (n=80). Although the robot’s personalizations were less sophisticated than what a human tutor can do, we still witnessed a “one-sigma” improvement (68th percentile) in post-tests between treatment and control groups. We present these results as evidence that even relatively simple personalizations can yield significant benefits in educational or assistive human-robot interactions. Categories and Subject Descriptors I.2.9 [Artificial Intelligence]: Robotics; J.4 [Computer Applications]: Social And Behavioral Sciences—Psychology General Terms Experimentation <s> BIB003
Nearly all studies have taken place in a classroom or on a school's premises. Some studies have engaged children when they are in groups, while other studies examine the effects robots have on individuals when they are interacting individually with the robot. There is definitely a balance to be had. While learners might find it more fun and comfortable to interact in a group BIB002 , those who receive one-on-one tutoring usually score much better than those who receive classroom education BIB001 . In the educational HRI literature, this one-on-one interaction with robots has led to learning gains one standard deviation above the mean BIB003 . It is advantageous, therefore, to develop robots for these dual contexts, or to develop robots both specifically to interact with individuals and those meant to interact with groups. As well, research outside the school (i.e., in the home) should be conducted to determine how individuals might interact and learn from robots in less structured environments, especially since free time that might be devoted to learning is more abundant in the home.