The project deployment allowed us to target four closely interconnected specific objectives. We first aimed to strengthen primary school teachers' confidence and skills (O1) by offering them training in educational robotics and programming anchored in humanities disciplines, while providing them with pedagogical resources directly usable in the classroom (O2) in the form of lesson plans linking computational thinking and the humanities. In parallel, we wanted to test these resources with teachers and their pupils (O3) in order to assess their relevance in real school settings. This entire approach was part of a cross-cutting commitment to improving the quality of education for all pupils by integrating an inclusive approach (O4) into all project deliverables, from design to deployment.
In many European contexts, primary school teachers have few training opportunities in educational robotics and programming, particularly in the humanities where they lack pedagogical frameworks to integrate these approaches. A survey conducted among one hundred and ninety-one teachers in the four consortium countries at the start of the project confirmed this observation: respondents acknowledged the value of these tools but reported lacking the skills, methods, and confidence to use them in everyday teaching sequences. The health crisis highlighted inequalities in access to digital technology, particularly in schools serving disadvantaged populations. Added to this training gap was the absence of inclusive resources to adapt teaching to pupils with diverse profiles: special educational needs, socioeconomic, cultural, and gender diversity. The Robots Meet Arts consortium addressed this twofold gap by developing training grounded in teachers' needs and inspiring, inclusive resources showing how robotics and programming can serve the humanities.