Robotics Competition

This is a video of an exhibition round we were in. This round was their highest scoring round at 235 points, but did not count. If we would have been able to keep this score, we would have been in 2nd place. The first round of competition they scored 130, second round they scored 190 and the third round they scored 210. The first place team had a score of 245, second place was 235 and the third place score was a tie at 225.

The LKSD District robotics competition was held here at BRHS on Monday and Tuesday. I have been meaning to write about robotics for awhile now. I got the opportunity to coach the 8th grade BRHS robotics team. The team consisted of 8 boys who called themselves the ElectroWarriors. This year's theme was energy. The robotics program is put on by FFL, First Lego League. There is a link on the right if you're interested in learning more about the program. At first when I heard it was lego robotics, I thought it was going to be kind of lame, but it was actually really neat. It is a very well designed program.

Basically, the program has two parts. First, the robot challenge. Students have to build a robot and program it to complete tasks on a mission field. The tasks are all related to the theme, which was alternative energy. Some examples of mission that their robot had to complete are...put a hydroelectric dam over a river...connect communities to a power grid...put a solar panel on top of a house...place a wave turbine in the ocean...plant trees...place wind turbines in communities, etc.

The second part of the program is the project. The students have to complete a project that goes with the theme. To go with the energy theme, students had to complete an energy audit on a building and come up with ways to either reduce energy consumption or move toward the use of alternative energy. The ElectroWarriors actually chose to audit two houses...one running on "regular" energy and the other one completely powered by alternative energy.

Robotics has definitely kept me busy so far this year. We had practices every Monday and Friday since pretty much the beginning of the year. After Thanksgiving break, we had practice everyday to get ready for competition. We also had an open house to present our energy findings to the community.

Competition was two days of jam packed excitement and hard work. There were 15 teams at the competition. The competition basically consisted of five parts...the robot performance judging, the project judging, the design and programming judging, the teamwork judging, and gracious professionalism. These are the things that are looked at to decide which teams move up to the next level of competition....the state competition in Anchorage. Only two teams go on to state.

For the robot performance judging, they have 2.5 minutes to complete tasks on the playing field. Each task is worth points. They do three rounds and then use your high score to determine how you did. During project judging, the students share what they learned while doing the project. The ElectroWarriors scored first in project judging. They put together a skit where there was a husband and wife looking to buy a house. They had two real estate companies...one that sold regular houses and another that sold houses running on alternative energy. For the design and programming judging, they had to show the judges their robot design and the programs. They were judged on how complicated and high tech their design and programming was. For the teamwork judging, they had to use spaghetti noodles and marshmellows to build the tallest, sturdiest structure possible. This test was used to see how well they worked as a team. I thought they did really well at this task. Finally, gracious professionalism was judged throughout the whole tournament. This is looking for students who have positive attitudes and teams that are not just there to win, but to learn something and gain experience.

Our team did not earn the Award of Distinction to move on to state, but the BRHS 7th grade team did. Go PowerWarriors!

It was fun and interesting to be the robotics coach. I know I'll be a better coach next year because of my experiences this year. Maybe next year I'll ask to coach the 7th grade team so I can be Avery's coach.