One of my favorite features of the AIM Robot is how you can display images on the screen - like emojis! VEXcode AIM has a built-in repertoire of 36 different emojis, offering a range of positive and negative feelings to express on your robot.
Of course these add a fun twist to any project, and will be engaging for students while coding their AIM Robot to complete challenges. You could show different emojis during different parts of a project to add a creative customization element. For instance, in this simple project to get and kick a ball, the AIM Robot shows Thinking when ‘looking for’ the ball, Excited when driving the get the ball, and Thrilled once the ball is kicked.
It also allows for a fun opportunity to use the emojis as project organizers themselves. Students can sequence lights, sounds, and movements to match the emoji shown and represent that feeling with robot behaviors. For instance, this project has the robot ‘act out’ each of the emojis shown, across a range of feelings.
The range of emojis offers a wonderful opportunity to get into conversations about how certain feelings differ from one another, and how each of us experience them. Building students’ emotional vocabulary through computer science is a unique learning experience that I can’t wait to see happen in classrooms!
