For the last month we have been preparing for our qualifying tournament. We arrived to the tournament around 8am and finished up around 4:30pm. It was a VERY long day, but sooooo worth the opportunity and experience for everyone. Since this was our Rookie Year it was hard for the students to know what to expect. I tried to prepare them with videos of previous year's contests, they ran through what the day would look like, talked, programmed, rebuilt and modified, worked together, and freaked out together. All the prep work however, did not fully prepare them for the day. They were all amazed and wowed by the day. Each team was given 4 opportunities to complete the 2 minute 30 second Robot Mission. Then, the teams went into 3 different judging rooms for a Core Values activity, the presentation of the Robot Project, and the presentation of the Robot Design. Communication, team work, and gracious professionalism was key for all judging rooms. The teams did great speaking about how they spent their time on the various components of the Into Orbit season. Even our parents who came along to support their children were finally able to see what their kiddos were working on the the last 4 months. We were all impressed and proud of how our teams worked together throughout the day to solve problems, act quickly on their feet, and support each other. Both teams ran into issues and complications early in the morning and had to modify their designs and rework their programs. It was a problem for the teams, but they faced it calmly and rose to the challenges the day threw at them. This was my Rookie Year too and I could not have been more happy and proud of how the season turned out! It was amazing to see how the teams came together and the team members who stepped up in the end when problems emerged. The First Lego League is truly a great opportunity for kids to get involved in something great that can take them a long way in life. I hope my own children can have a chance to join a great FLL Jr., FLL, or FTC team if the opportunity comes along.
0 Comments
The teams have been so busy and making great progress! I have been so busy with them I have completely forgotten about posting updates. I love starting off practice with core values exercises and activities. I enjoy watching how the kids interact with each other and solve their problems. We are about a month away from competition and I am a bit worried about how much we will have completed for tournament day. One team has 1 program mission that runs, but my other team is still working on the programming. I know other "Rookie" teams are in the same boat. I have to remember the kids have to do the work, I am only there to supervise and guide. Easier said than done at times! I am very proud of their work this season and whatever they compete with they should be proud of all the time and hard work they put in. Here are a bunch of pics from our last few meetings.We has our first Saturday meeting this past week. The kiddos came in and got alot of great work done together. They are really starting to make progress and get excited about what the robot will do with the missions. It did help that Krispy Kreme may have been on hand to "fuel" our early Saturday session :). This week I told the kids that I will be planing out their sessions less and less. I will still have the first 30 minutes for set up, snack, and Core Value teamwork. As a team they will need to decide where their focus needs to be and who will be accomplishing what. Core Values Activity-This week's Core Values was the Moving Marbles. It involved each team member having 2 toilet paper polls, the first person gets 1 toilet paper roll and 1 marble and the last person gets a cup and 1 toilet paper roll. The challenge was the marble had to make its way through each toilet paper roll and end in the cup that is on the floor. Teams did great! They did not even need close to the 5 minutes I gave them. So, I add more marbles and a few twists to make it more challenging. This is always fun to watch! Practice Pics-A lot of great progress has been made with getting both team's base robot built, possible attachments to complete missions, and investigations into how to program the robot. To see the kiddos eyes light up and their amazement once something works or turns out like they planned is amazing. It is why I went into teaching.....the aha moment!
Commander Stacy from Challenger Learning Center provides "expert" knowledge for Robot Project9/20/2018 Students had a great time listening and engaging with Commander Stacy Shrewsbury from the Challenger Learning Center in Normal, IL. We heard about many of the problems astronauts face while in space for extended periods of time. Students were able to see what the space suits are made of and even were able to try "space" ice cream.Core Values-Helium Stick ChallengeThis was an awesome team building exercise. I loved watching and listening how the students interacted together. Practice two DONE! Practice is so busy and the kiddos are having so much fun. This practice I broke all the students up into the 2 teams for the season. We now have Team Ponti-Hackers and Team Scorpigons. While one team was working on team identity, getting to know each other, and discussing base robots the other team was reviewing the Robot Game and all the missions. After about 30 minutes the teams switched. In the upcoming weeks, teams will be working on logos, what their t-shirts will look like, designing posters, and other media for the season. Teams will need more time to discuss missions and strategies. We finished practice with the students working with the EV3 sets to build a basic robot and program it to move. Everyone didn't get finished, so I will make sure to give them another 30 mins. to get everything programmed and running. We have 18 5th-8th grade PJHS students who said they were interested in joining out first ever First Lego League (FLL). When a team can only have 10 students, what else is there to do but add another team! Our first practice of 2 1/2 hours just flew by! Even the kiddos could not believe when I told them there were only 10 minutes left. We began practice with going over what they could expect for the season with core values, the robot project, and the robot game. Then, we watched a description of each mission, went to the game board to actually see what it would like, and discuses first thoughts about how we can do this. After a quick break we broke up into 4 teams to work on a Survival Core Values activity. We ended practice working with a partner to build a basic robot. We all had a BLAST! p.s. I even gave homework :) But, I don't think they will mind the tasks they have to research-they were all hooked. FIRST LEGO LEAGUE IS HERE!! FIRST LEGO LEAGUE IS HERE!!
ANYONE in grades 5-8 is welcome! What is FLL? First Lego League is a robotics program for 9 to 14 year olds, which is designed to get children excited about science, technology, engineering, and math-- and teach them valuable employment and life skills. In FLL, teams learn both through what we do (the Robot Game and the Project) and how we do it (the FLL Core Values). Through the Robot Game teams build and program an autonomous robot using LEGO EV3 MINDSTORMS. Our team will have 2 ½ minutes to accomplish our chosen missions. Missions that are successful in the allotted time will receive completion points. Through the project, teams explore an actual problem that today’s scientists and engineers are trying to solve, develop an innovative solution to that problem (either by creating something that doesn't exist or build upon something that does), and share their findings with others. This year's theme is Into Orbit and will deal with solving problems in space. We are very excited to welcome Caterpillar as our sponsor this year! We look forward to their mentorship in our program. Our robotics season will be August-January-with meetings at least one day (2 1/2 hours) after school each week. If this sounds like something your child would like to join this year, please attend a parent and student meeting on Thursday, August 23 at 5:30 p.m in the Library at Pontiac Junior High School. The First Lego League team members will be chosen and notified Friday, August 24 before the end of the school day. If you are unable to attend or have questions please email the Head Coach, Christine Chiodo, at [email protected] First Lego League Site- https://www.firstinspires.org/robotics/fll This year's challenge- https://www.firstinspires.org/robotics/fll/challenge-and-season-info |
Christine ChiodoI am a junior high teacher at Pontiac Junior High School. Archives
December 2018
Categories |