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Curriculum For Coding, Robotics and AI

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Learning for Primary Grade Students

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Executive Summary

This course is designed after analyzing the computing course designed by

oxford international primary curriculum, the latest interventions proposed
by the tech giants (Google, IBM) especially related to AI and cyber safety
and, finally, incorporating the teaching experience gained at NUST while
teaching disruptive technologies at MS/PhD level.

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The standard Oxford International Primary Curriculum, designed for age
group (K 1-9) has identified five core areas, i.e., Introduction to Technology
(Computers), Digital Literacy, Computational Thinking (Programming),

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Multimedia Content Generation, and Crunching Numbers (Using Excel).

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Although diverse, this curriculum (which is the standard in private schools)
lacks AI and robotics content.

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We leverage two important interventions proposed by IBM and Google to include AI and Cyber

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Safety. Firstly we introduce the AI/Machine Learning content designed for kids by IBM. This
content is designed so that even kids can design AI models without programming expertise and
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understand limitations and myths related to the AI world. This high level introduction to the AI
world is equally beneficial to executives. One can design an AI model in 5 minutes.
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Secondly, we leverage the Be Interne Awesome Again curriculum designed by Google to address
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contemporary challenges like fake news and cyber theft. There are easy games for primary kids
to equip them with skills to protect themselves. Again, these games are equally valuable with
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adults.
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Finally, we include interesting robotics concepts that are beyond playing with expensive kits. We
leverage our teaching experience for this endeavor. These include questions like what can we
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learn from ants? How good at drawing makes you good at AI? How did the computer beat the
Chess grandmaster?
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We have made an effort where minimal resources are required to scale this curriculum to
underdeveloped areas.
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For further details contact:

Dr. M. Wajahat Hussain
Associate Professor, SEECS, NUST
[email protected]
+923105397811
Programming
We have designed two modules for programming. One includes the famous scratch programming
interface which is mainly for the age group (K 1-3). The second module is based on the more
widely used and more functional programming language Python for age group (K 4-5).

We have incorporated programming concepts which will transform the experience from game
playing to fundamental programming mindset gradually.

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Scratch Programming
● Build your own game in 5 minutes in Scratch
● Let's see who improves the game?

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● What is a variable: The Tale of Benny the Brave Squirrel

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● Variable swap: Tiger, Goat and Bundle of Grass
● Build your own calculator in scratch
● Ask the Scratch cat to recite the tables

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● Conditional statement: Agar, Aur Magar Ki Boli

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● Relational operators: Win, Lose or Draw
● Logical puzzles involving AND, OR logic
● Loops: Bar Bar, Lagatar
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● Difference between For (Repeat) and While (Repeat Until) loop?
● Loop within a Loop
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● Design advanced games in Scratch

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Python
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● How to use google drive to save your data?

● How to open a file without a mouse?
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● How does the computer organize files? Can you find a file in one sec out of 100000 files?
Yes
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● Why is Linux better than windows? Because it's free!

● Make the flag of Pakistan with only a single command!
● How to create a variable in python?
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● Make an advanced calculator in python.

● Conditional statement in Python: Agar, Aur Magar Ki Boli
● Relational operators in Python: Win, Lose or Draw
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● Loops in Python: Bar Bar, Lagatar

● Design Hangman In Python
AI Ideas

As mentioned in the executive summary, there are two main highlights of the AI curriculum.
Firstly, we are using the freely available tools developed by IBM to train AI models within a few
minutes without having any expertise. One can figure out the limitations of AI models like
biasness and dependency on data.

Secondly, we inculcate curiosity in kids by informing them how famous algorithms were

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designed in history by observing animals like ants and how simple skills like drawing enables
you to solve important problems with AI.

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Here again we have designed curriculum for two age groups

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For Age Group (K 1-3)
● Build your own Alexa (chat bot) that understands urdu!

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● What are three steps of training an AI system?
● Can you beat the robots? Yes but how?
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● What do we learn from ants?
● How did the computer beat the chess grandmaster? Using the coloring trick!
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For Age Group (K 4-5)
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● Intelligent machines do lie! What do we learn from ugly duckling story?

● Data is the new currency! But you can’t use Google images without asking.
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● How to get images for free?

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● Want to be good at AI? Start Coloring!

● Design a face recognition App.
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Cyber Safety
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With deep fakes and cyber crimes on the rise, mainly due to generative AI, we need to develop
skills to protect ourselves from such content. Therefore, we leverage the games designed by
Google to inculcate this defense mechanism in kids for all age groups.
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● How to detect fake news? Learning through gamification. Acquire Google certificate!
● How to detect fake websites?
● Learn how to share stuff online.
● How to create strong passwords?
● How to avoid cyber bullying?
Robotics

Finally, there is a lot of interest by parents and kids to include robotics content in the curriculum.
This mainly revolves around expensive robotics kits which are entertaining. However, it remains
to be seen if they are scalable and actually import life long skills.

We have discovered open source alternatives to well renowned Lego MindStorms Kits. Here is
the list of activities to be covered.

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● Building five minute bot
● Fixed path following competition

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● Introduction to sensors in robotics
● Building robots with sensors

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● Obstacle avoidance competition
● Introduction to gears
● Building robots with gears

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● Speed racing competition
● Ramp climbing competition
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Path planning in robotics
Implementation of simple path planner
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● Maze finder competition
● Agility in robotics
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● Building agile designs of robots

● Grand Sumo wrestling competition
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