Practical Robotics in Computer Science Using the LEGO NXT: An Experience Report

Abstract

We report on our experience building and implementing a robotics course for Computer Science based on the LEGO NXT. The goal of the course is to provide students with an opportunity to learn the fundamental principles involved in designing, programming, and operating mobile robots in a completely experiential setting, while abstracting away the hardware complexity of typical robotics platforms. To this end, we built the course around the LEGO NXT robot kits. We have developed a software framework that allows the NXT to be used in conjunction with a laptop computer and a webcam to enable our students to learn in the context of a robotics soccer game. We describe the process of designing the robotics soccer project so that it is tightly coupled with course learning goals, and report on our experience running the course over the past three years. The software platform is freely available, and allows anyone with a webcam-equipped laptop and an NXT set to implement their own soccer playing bot.