Philly-based LocoRobo, makers of STEM learning tools for kids, just launched a $20,000 KickStarter campaign aimed to help manufacture its latest creation: a tiny programmable robot called Loopy.

The company, founded by Drexel University Ph.D. Pramod Abichandani, says Loopy’s AI and on-board sensors allow the toy to “learn and grow over time, personalize his responses to his human companion, and react to the world around him,” writes Roberto Torres at technical.ly.

[uam_ad id=”54865″]

“Social robotics for children has been a research area of interest for me since my days at Drexel,” the researcher said. “Loopy will have a positive impact on STEM education, laying the foundation to make it more fun for children at the earliest levels of education (kindergarten to second grade) to learn computational thinking as a pre-cursor to computer science.”

To read the full story, click here.

[uam_ad id=”54875″]