Dancing Robots: A Collaboration Between Elementary School and University Engineering Students

Abstract

We describe the benefits of a collaborative and creative mentorsupported engineering program conducted between a group of fifth- and sixth-grade students and engineering undergraduate students. The elementary students and undergraduates collaborated in small teams to design and build robots that would dance together. The program was augmented with mentors from the Society of Women Engineers who helped run weekly after school sessions at the elementary school. This program engaged elementary students in engineering design with a collaborative gender-neutral project. Moreover, this program exposed a group of elementary students with a predominantly masculine perception of engineering to female engineer mentors for the first time. By the end of the program, students developed a more comprehensive understanding of engineering and everyone considered engineering as a possible career.