Higashihikari elementary school welcomed a robot through its doors this week. A new model Robovie will join the Japanese school's students for classes over 14 months, aiming to gain sentience strike up interactions with multiple people -- and learn from it. The Robovie's conversation level is apparently equal to a five-year-old child, although it's been augmented with all the know-how of a fifth-grade science textbook and preloaded with 119 facial photos and voiceprints of teachers and students. It's the first long-term project for the International Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute's 1.2-meter bot, with the scientists reckoning that the school environment should offer its robot
