WEST COLUMBIA, S.C. — One Lexington Two school is helping students learn by using robots in the classroom.
As technology progresses, it has continued to change the way student learn at school.
Savannah Kelly is a second grade teacher at Saluda River Academy of the Arts. She says around March, they introduced ABII to the classroom.
"This robot helps kids with reading, and it goes through different lessons with the child, and it kind of monitors that they're getting the answers correct or incorrect and kind of leads them and helps them so it's kind of like another teacher in the classroom," said Kelly.
It's not a situation where the robot is replacing the teacher. It's just a tool kids can use to spend extra time learning.
The district is using the robot at both Saluda River Arts Academy and Springdale Elementary. They plan on using it for summer reading camps as well.
The teacher believes it's helpful when she's working with small groups in class and the robot can work with students while Kelly is helping others.
ABII helps monitor engagement and can tell when a student is not paying attention or isn't focused. The robot keeps track of the data so the teacher can get more insight on how much each student is learning.
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"It's been helpful," explained Kelly. "It's cool to see the technology grow just because I think we've all been especially growing up through the time period that I did. It's been a very growth mindset with technology because there's things coming out so quickly. And I know a lot of people would probably be a little bit nervous about that type of technology, but I think it's really cool.
Ranna, one of the students, loves using ABII to learn.
"When you answer a question correctly or a few of them, it brings up a different song every time, and it's really fun because you get to dance with it too," said Ranna. "It's a little bit challenging because I get my index and glossary mixed up, that helped me a little bit."
While the robot is part of a pilot program at the moment, the teacher hopes it will continue in the future.
"I think it's a super cool program," said Kelly. "I think that if it is helping our kids and the research comes back showing that there has been improvement with the students working with ABII, then I hope that they do keep it because if there's anything that can help our kids to grow, then I think that's a wonderful thing that we should keep in our classroom."
The school district says high school students are able to learn how to program these robots and build them.