An Integrated System to approach the Programming of Humanoid Robotics Elisa Tosello, Roberto Bortoletto, Stefano Michieletto, Enrico Pagello, and Emanuele Menegatti Intelligent Autonomous Systems Lab (IAS-Lab) Department of Information Engineering (DEI) University of Padua {toselloe,bortolet,michieletto,epv,emg}@dei.unipd.it http://robotics.dei.unipd.it Abstract. This paper describes a set of laboratory experiences focused on humanoid robots offered at the University of Padua. Instructors de- veloped an integrated system through which students can work with robots. The aim is to improve the educational experience introducing a new learning tool, namely a humanoid robot, and the Robots Operating System (ROS) in a constructivist framework. This approach to robotics teaching lets students exploiting up-to-date robotic technologies and to deal with multidisciplinary problems, applying a scientific approach. By using humanoid robots, students are able to compare human movements to robot motion. The comparison brings out human/robot similarities, pushing students to solve complex motion problems in a more natural way while discovering robot limitations. In this paper, the learning ob- jectives of the project, and the tools used by the students are presented. A set of evaluation results are provided in order to validate the authors’ purpose. Finally, a discussion about designed experiences and possible future improvements is reported, hoping to encourage further spread of educational robotics in schools at all levels. Keywords: Simulation, Humanoid Robots, Teaching Robotics, ROS, Gazebo, Robovie-X 1 Introduction Educational Technologies (ETs), meant as the set of practices designed to en- hance the learning activities, can be used as means for didactic activities in different specific contexts. In particular, Educational Robotics (ER) adapts stu- dents to current technologies, where the Automation Technology (which is re- lated to the use of mechanical, electronic and computer-bases, in the operation and control of the autonomous systems) plays a very important role. Robotics involves several fields from computer vision to motion planning, from humanoids to manipulators and wheeled robots. There are three main methods that can be adopted to teach a discipline: behaviorist, cognitive, and constructivist. We decided to follow the construc- tivist approach because of several advantages attested in different psychological Proceedings of 4th International Workshop Teaching Robotics, Teaching with Robotics & 5th International Conference Robotics in Education Padova (Italy) July 18, 2014 ISBN 978-88-95872-06-3 pp. 93-100