Asean’s first AI robot teacher introduced
Thai schoolchildren will soon benefit from artificial intelligence in the classroom, according to Suwit Mesinsee, Minister of Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation, who announced at the KidBright Developer Conference 2019 (KDC19) on Wednesday (November 27), that the “Coding at School Powered by KidBright” project has already delivered 200,000 AI teaching kits to high schools and colleges nationwide.
“The project is a collaboration between the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) and the National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC), and is designed to teach coding and programming to students to familiarise them with artificial intelligence technology,” he said. “The project also further expands the ‘Coding at School for Teacher’ or ‘KruKid Contest’ initiative which aims to boost teachers’ abilities in teaching coding and AI related topics.”
The ‘KidBright AIBot’, Asean’s first robot that combines the teaching of block coding and AI technology, was also introduced at the conference. “This robot is the first step towards the Ministry’s policy to promote Thailand as an AI nation,” he said. “Simplifying the AI subjects to improve students’ understanding and visualization will help boost efficiency in producing personnel equipped with skills in AI technology, as well as creating a platform for AI entrepreneurs to develop their products with added economic value and variety of applications.”
NSTDA president Narong Sirilertworakul added that the KidBright project is having a positive effect on several industrial sectors. “In 2019 the project stimulated the manufacturing of AI circuit boards with more than 10,000 components, and has generated products for AI teaching kits such as IKB-1, GoGo Bright and KB-IDE,” he said. “Two business organisations, namely Innovative Experiment and Thai Dot Com already applied to use KidBright boards for commercial use.”