Learning Robots: Teaching Design Students in Integrating Intelligence

The present day society requires specialists with multidisciplinary knowledge and skills. We discuss the possibilities to educate professionals that design intelligent products and systems as a result of a competency based education. In particular this paper features a teaching method that makes the students use intelligent algorithms that control robot behavior in a way that the robot can solve design problems with practical relevance, and reach human to machine interaction that includes machine intelligence. The outcomes of 14 cases done over 4 years showed that most students were able to integrate the required competencies in a synergistic way. Within 80 hours they could master the technical complexity of controlling a robot through a neural learning algorithm in well-grounded design cases.