Saya-Sensei is the new Synthetic substitute teacher in Japan

The talking humanoid, “Saya” who was originally developed as a receptionist robot in 2004 by professor Hiroshi Kobayashi of the Tokyo University of Science, was recently discovered by students at a Tokyo Elementary school. The students who’d returned from their Golden Week Holidays were more than delighted to find that their human class teacher was replaced by “Saya”, who can speak multiple languages and uses facial expressions to facilitate communication. An array of motors in her head stretches the soft synthetic skin to various positions, allowing Saya to display emotions ranging from happiness to anger, and surprise to sadness.

But Saya’s designation as a teacher still needs some ‘schooling’ as she cannot do anything more than calling out names shouting orders like “Be quiet” (which is the patented dialogues of a sorry, ineffective teacher) According to Mr Kobayashi “Robots that look human tend to be a huge hit with children and parents” Yeah, why not, They make the best classroom toys ever! As you can see amused kids poking Saya’s soft face!