CoWriter – iReCHeCk

Learning to write with a robot

The CoWriter Project and its active follow-up iReCHeCk aim at exploring how a robot can help children with the acquisition of handwriting, with an original approach: the children are the teachers who help the robot to write better! This paradigm, known as learning by teaching, has several powerful effects: it boosts the children’ self-esteem (which is especially important for children with handwriting difficulties), it gets them to practice hand-writing without even noticing, and it engages them into a particular interaction with the robot called the Protégé effect: because they unconsciously feel that they are somehow responsible if the robot does not succeed in improving its writing skills, they commit to the interaction, and make particular efforts to figure out what is difficult for the robot, thus developing their metacognitive skills and reflecting on their own errors.

Handwriting disorder (termed dysgraphia) is a far from a singular problem as nearly 8.6% of the population in France is considered dysgraphic. With the increase of cognitive demands of school work, handwriting rapidly becomes a limiting task for these children, who cannot handle simultaneous tasks such as handwriting, grammar, orthography, and composition, and who may thus rapidly face general learning difficulties. It is therefore crucial to detect and remediate handwriting difficulties as soon as possible.

At the moment, the detection of dysgraphia is performed through a standard test called BHK. This detection is laborious because of its high cost and subjectivity. 

2020

CoWriting Kazakh: Learning a New Script with a Robot

A. Sandygulova; W. Johal; Z. Zhexenova; B. Tleubayev; A. Zhanatkyzy et al. 

2020-03-10. HRI ’20: ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, Cambridge, United Kingdom, March, 2020. DOI : 10.1145/3319502.3374813.

Mutual Understanding in Educational Human-Robot Collaborations

A. D. Jacq / P. Dillenbourg; A. Paiva (Dir.)  

Lausanne, EPFL, 2020. 

2019

publication thumbnail

CoPainter: Interactive AI drawing experience

P. Golinski 

2019-01-17.

Learning By Collaborative Teaching : An Engaging Multi-Party CoWriter Activity

L. El-Hamamsy; W. Johal; T. L. C. Asselborn; J. Nasir; P. Dillenbourg 

2019. The 28th IEEE International Conference on Robot & Human Interactive Communication (RoMan 2019), New Delhi, India, October 14 – 18, 2019. DOI : 10.1109/RO-MAN46459.2019.8956358.

2018

Automated human-level diagnosis of dysgraphia using a consumer tablet

T. L. C. Asselborn; T. Gargot; L. Kidzinski; W. Johal; D. Cohen et al. 

npj Digital Medicine. 2018-08-31. Vol. 1, p. 42. DOI : 10.1038/s41746-018-0049-x.

2016

Child-Robot Spatial Arrangement in a Learning by Teaching Activity

W. Johal; A. D. Jacq; A. Paiva; P. Dillenbourg 

2016. 25th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, New York, USA, August 26-31, 2016. p. 533-538. DOI : 10.1109/ROMAN.2016.7745169.

Learning by Teaching a Robot: The Case of Handwriting

S. Lemaignan; A. D. Jacq; D. Hood; F. Garcia; A. Paiva et al. 

Robotics and Automation Magazine. 2016. Vol. 23, num. 2, p. 56-66. DOI : 10.1109/Mra.2016.2546700.

From Real-time Attention Assessment to “With-me-ness” in Human-Robot Interaction

S. Lemaignan; F. Garcia; A. D. Jacq; P. Dillenbourg 

2016. 11th ACM/IEEE Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, Christchurch, New Zealand, MAR 07-10, 2016. p. 157-164. DOI : 10.1109/HRI.2016.7451747.

Building Successful Long Child-Robot Interactions in a Learning Context

A. D. Jacq; s. Lemaignan; F. Garcia; P. Dillenbourg; A. Paiva 

2016. 11th ACM/IEEE Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, Christchurch, New Zealand, 2016. p. 239-246. DOI : 10.1109/HRI.2016.7451758.

2015

The CoWriter Project: Teaching a Robot how to Write

D. Hood; S. Lemaignan; P. Dillenbourg 

2015. 2015 Human-Robot Interaction Conference, Portand, USA, March 3-5, 2015. DOI : 10.1145/2701973.2702091.

When Children Teach a Robot to Write: An Autonomous Teachable Humanoid Which Uses Simulated Handwriting

D. Hood; S. Lemaignan; P. Dillenbourg 

2015. 2015 Human-Robot Interaction Conference, Portand, USA, March 3-5, 2015. DOI : 10.1145/2696454.2696479.