Coaching and mentoring teams of young builders for the Scotland Lego League tournament.

CLIENT: St. Patricks Primary School
PROJECT: First Lego League
DURATION: ongoing

THE BRIEF:

First Lego League is an exciting, international, robotics-based competition which challenges teams of children aged 9-16 to think like scientists and engineers. As mentors we were responsible for preparing and training the class for the robotics tournament whilst instilling within them the core values the Lego League.

Engineering solutions to real world problems.

PRACTICAL MAKING SKILLS:

engineering principles programming and building robots mathematics and trigonometry following complex instructions brainstorming presentation techniques storyboarding concepts creating infographics testing and evaluating robot designs and mechanical tool attachments testing and evaluating software finding alternative solutions to problems

CREATIVE LEARNING:

challenge hand eye coordination dexterity practical mechanics kinaesthetic learning customisation modification learn by trial and error analysis and evaluation learning through doing Iterative design exploration forming and testing ideas experimentation

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT:

Understanding team dynamics proactive fact finding self-reliance the spirit of friendly competition collaborating and sharing experiences having lots of fun winning is great but enjoying the journey is worth even more successful learner resilience team work helping others cooperative learning collaborative learning community cohesiveness commitment perseverance and self-belief inspiring enthusiasm the spirit of friendly competition creativity self-confidence

Insight & Reflection

This opportunity arose at the last minute, so we ran it mostly as a holiday activity over the Christmas period. The children really stepped up, gladly giving up their holiday time to work on programming their disaster relief rescue robot.

As well as robotics, a significant portion of the Lego League contest revolves around a research project which the team must undertake. The 2013/14 contest theme ‘Nature’s Fury’ became particularly poignant when the devastation caused by typhoon Haiyan became clear. The school already had contacts in the Philippines and were raising funds for a hospital which had been destroyed in the storm, so this became the focus of our research. It was deeply moving to see what began as a fun engineering and maths challenge gain so much more significance and resonance with everybody involved.

Young Ronen, our ‘chief programmer’, is now taking a lead role in organising his new (secondary) school to take part in this years competition. We look forward to supporting his team!

Robot Code

WHAT THEY SAID:

“I never knew programming could be so much fun!”.

Angie, initially a reluctantly draftee into the team's ‘coding division'.

“This was a really great experience for the children, they loved it so much. Not bad almost getting to the semi finals when we only had a fraction of the time to prepare. Next year we can definitely win it!”.

Arshad, father of team member Ibraheem.

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Angie and Ronen discuss programming strategies.