Twickenham schoolboy, 12, fighting cancer gets robot to stop him from missing too many lessons

A Twickenham schoolboy is roaming the hallways as a robot so he can keep up with lessons while battling a rare type of cancer. Howard Thomas received a grant for the AV1, an avatar and audio-visual bot, from the Chartwell Children’s Cancer Trust after missing lessons due to the side effects of intense chemotherapy sessions.

The 12-year-old received the shock diagnosis in December last year and started receiving treatment in January. Although still attending Turing House school on a part-time basis, the keen pupil feared falling behind when in hospital or at home.

However, thanks to the bot, he can now virtually join the classrooms of his South West London school. A camera lets him read textbooks and worksheets, and he can ask questions and join discussions via a speaker.

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Howard said: “The AV1 has been incredible! It's helped me to participate in class when I’m not well enough to be there. I have been able to keep up from an educational standpoint, so I don’t feel like I am falling behind."

The robot, nicknamed AV Howard, can also show emotions – if Howard feels ill or just wants to sit and listen, he can turn the bot’s head blue. It has even been given its own tie and is taken from lesson to lesson by other pupils.

Howard’s mum, Hermoine, said: “Howard is a high achiever and it stressed him out not being able to go to school, so the robot has been wonderful. He can discuss a worksheet with the other pupils and it's sociable; the other pupils wave goodbye to him at the end of a lesson. Howard will have the robot until he is ready to go back to school full-time. Thank you to Momentum for making the application for us.”

The Thomas family applied for the AV1 with from Momentum Children’s Charity, an organisation helping families across London, Surrey, and Sussex with children facing cancer or life-challenging conditions. The charity partners with hospitals to offer personally tailored support to the entire family via support workers, both in hospital and at home.

For more information on Momentum’s work, visit www.momentumcharity.org.

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