Background: Integrating novel technologies in the classroom has been a longstanding issue in education. Teachers often express reluctance due to negative attitudes. These attitudes may stem from various factors, including a lack of familiarity with the technology, concerns about its impact on traditional teaching methods, and a perceived threat to the teacher's role in the classroom. Motivation: Teachers' attitudes can potentially affect students' exposure to technology and shape their attitudes and perceptions. Also, attitudes toward robots can influence human-robot interaction in the classroom and beyond. Considering the increasing presence of robots in everyday life, it is important to assess the teachers' attitudes toward robots. This study contributes to the existing literature by offering insights into an unexplored population-Croatian teachers. Methods: This pilot study employed a quantitative primary data research design. Data was collected using a Google Forms survey. The survey consisted of demographic and backgroundrelated questions and the Negative Attitudes Toward Robots Scale (NARS). The NARS measures three dimensions of negative attitudes, namely negative attitudes toward situations of interaction with robots, social influence of robots, and emotions in interaction with robots. Results: The sample consisted of 62 teachers, 16 (26%) male and 46 (74%) female. The internal consistency of a Croatian translation of the NARS was acceptable$(\alpha>0,7)$in total and for all three sub-scales. Analysis showed that teachers using robots in teaching had less negative attitudes toward robots, yet the female sample exhibited more negative attitudes than male teachers. Unexpectedly, teachers in this study expressed more positive attitudes toward robots compared to Japanese students in the original study. Conclusion: Given that attitudes toward technology are often shaped by cultural factors, studying them in different contexts and countries contributes to a deeper understanding, leading to more effective adoption. The first contribution of this paper is piloting the translation of the NARS and an examination of its reliability and validity. The second contribution is studying the attitudes and providing insights into Croatian teachers' attitudes towards robots. Examining the attitudes toward robots through the lense of Eurobarometer, NARS, and teachers' characteristics, such as prior experience, gender, and educational context revealed general concerns and highlighted significant implications for the educational context.

This work-in-progress innovative practice paper presents a storytelling lesson about robot design aiming to familiarize students with the multidisciplinary nature of robotics as a career. The lesson is based on an integrated STEM approach and structured as a narrative that follows the journey of roboticists in designing a robotic model of a rabbit by using the LEGO® Spike Prime robotic set. Students are immersed in the storyline as characters helping roboticists to test and evaluate their designs. This practical constructivist assignment includes two steps: 1) testing and evaluating assembly instructions and 2) testing and evaluating the two models (visually and by using programming exercises). The two models present distinctive styles of assembly instructions, standard LEGO® building instructions made in Studio 2.0 and 3D building instructions made in BuildIn3D. When it comes to design, the models display different orientations (vertical and horizontal), complexity (number of parts), and mechanics of movement. For this reason, this lesson also serves as a usability and comparative study. Lesson sheets narrate the story and guide the progression while also serving as a testing diary and reflection tool. This approach where students internalize lessons through personal involvement was chosen to facilitate engagement and support problem-solving and knowledge building, scientific inquiry, critical thinking, design thinking, think-pair-share, discovery, and discussion. The lesson was piloted during the teachers' training, after which teachers presented it to their students in elementary schools. Results are based on feedback from 42 students and 11 teachers. Results show that 17% of students included in the study never owned or assembled LEGO®. When it comes to assembly instructions, students considered standard instructions easier to navigate and follow with clearer illustrations and steps. On the other hand, they recognized that 3D instructions provided more detail and expressed that the interactive display from different angles positively affected their building experience. The easier assembly of model 1 was least affected by the clarity of instructions but rather attributed to fewer parts and the simplicity of the model. Although 95% considered model 2 more difficult to assemble, 59% expressed they would prefer to assemble that model over model 1.

Background: With the advancement of technology and its’ potential as a tool in educational activities, the transformation of the ways teachers organize and teach in modern classrooms was imposed. Yet, learning new technologies and developing pedagogical activities that incorporate such tools could be a challenge for teachers. Because of the different background knowledge of the participants in this study and also their students, the traditional ex-cathedra approach might not be suitable to promote quality progression, facilitate experimentation and interestingness with the platform, and maintain interestObjective: This innovative practice full paper presents a user experience and usability study targeting teachers. The first aim of the study was to investigate the personal experience of teachers and reveal issues associated with the utilization of the platform and materials. On the other hand, the second objective was related to the practical applicability of such in their everyday teaching. Teachers’ feedback and recommendations are important for the improvement of the materials to fit the needs of the classroom and to make use of the full potential a platform offers.Methods: Data collection was conducted during the workshop utilizing an emerging developing microcontroller, VIDI X. VIDI X is a new educational tool that can have ample uses in technology education as a multifunctional microcontroller, a developing board, or as a cluster hub with multiple sensors. The workshop aimed to familiarize teachers with the new learning tool and propose content and pedagogy that could be adapted to the classroom environment. They constituted a basic introduction to electronic components and programming in Arduino IDE. The instructional methodology for the workshop was based on instructional scaffolding. The workbook was organized into lessons with gradually increasing task difficulty. The educators provided instructions when needed to each participant individually. To evaluate the content of the workshop and the microcontroller, a questionnaire was administered immediately after the workshop. The questionnaire comprised: 1) participants’ background information, 2) content of the workshop, and 3) VIDI X. User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ) that covers attractiveness, pragmatic, and hedonic quality was utilized to appraise VIDI X.Results: The analysis of the workshop questionnaire showed that the teachers’ liked the workshop and the workbook. Furthermore, the microcontroller and the workbook are suitable for high school students. The analysis of the UEQ showed that the VIDI X was perceived positively on all items, and scales compared to the UEQ benchmark.Conclusion: As today’s students have different prior knowledge in the field of programming, electronics and robotics, the proposed workshop where everyone is progressing at their own pace accompanied with the support of educators, seems to be a good approach to educating in the future.

In this work in progress paper we present an example of innovative practice in organizing informal STEM education workshops with young children. The workshops were divided into two learning scenarios, unplugged programming and hands-on robot play. Unplugged programming encourages understanding of the core concepts of programming such as algorithms and computational thinking rather than focusing on the programming language. In the second learning scenario, pupils were introduced to two educational robots used as a learning tool - Thymio and Codey Rocky. The aim of the second activity was linking the programming concept to a real-world scenario. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected using pre- and post- questionnaires. The pre-questionnaires contained questions about the pupils' background knowledge, i.e. basic concepts of programming and robotics. The post-questionnaires were designed to evaluate the workshops impact on the pupils' perception of these observed concepts and their overall satisfaction with the workshops. Combining unplugged activities with robots helps bridging the gap between imagination and reality, therefore improving learning.