Giving children a taste of robotics
Five-day workshop held at Fulki
Robotics may sound like a daunting topic of advanced engineering, but for 25 children of Fulki, it became an exciting week of creating their cool little machines.
A robotics workshop at the experimental primary education institute of Chattogram ended on Tuesday night, organised by local organisation CTGIT Services Limited, in association with two robotics training organisations -- India's Mirae Robotics and Dhaka-based Robotics Innovation Limited.
The young participants at the workshop received lessons on assembling robots, at the school auditorium.
“When a child is given the independence to break apart an object - it doesn't teach him to be destructive. Rather, it teaches him to look inside of a creation. He can then take the pieces, assemble those and recreate the thing,” said Sankalp Tailang, chairman of Mirae Robotics and instructor of the workshop.
The workshop let the children utilise their curiosity and be creative through an intensive “Creative Programming Engineering Management” method, he said.
Students were introduced to robotics, the technology behind it, basic programming, kits to build robots, different models and functions of robots, use of sensors and use of robots in human life at the workshop.
On the closing day, excited students were seen playing with small robots that they assembled and coded themselves -- like line follower, edge avoider and robotic arm.
“I never thought building anything could be so enjoyable. If such workshop happens in our school again, I'll make sure not to miss it,” said Shehtab Abdullah, a fourth-grader.
Tahmina Begum, mother of a student, expressed her heartfelt joy about the initiative.
“My daughter cannot concentrate on anything for too long. I was worried about it. But I saw a new side to her after this workshop. Now I know where her true interest lies,” said Tahmina.
All the students were given certificates by veteran journalist Abul Momen, who was a special guest at the closing ceremony.
He said, “Creativity and thinking are the most important things for a person. We will teach our children traditions of our country, but we must bring them up as citizens of 2018. Such initiatives will help them keep up with the time.”
Shila Momen, principal of the school, was present as special guest, while Abu Tayeb, chairman of CTGIT, presided over the event.