FIRST Lego League

While I'm interested in using Lego Robotics in the classroom in any way possible I admit my true passion lies with FIRST Lego League (FLL).

FLL is a Lego Robotics competition for students aged 9-16 and in 2014 over 265,000 students competed across the globe.  Each year FLL has a theme that is based around a real world issue. In the past themes have included Senior Solutions (2012) - focusing on the challenges faced by the elderly in society, Natures Fury (2013) - learning about natural disasters and World Class (2014) - the changing face of education and how students learn. The competition is split into four parts:

• Robot Game - played on a 2362x1143mm table, students build a program an autonomous robot capable of solving a variety of lego model challenges related to the theme, for example rescuing a Lego cat and dog from a natural disaster. At the competition students compete in three 2:30 minutes runs where the robot solves challenges for points.
• Project - students research an issue to do with the theme. They identify a problem and propose (and sometimes implement) a solution to the problem sharing it with the relevant stakeholders. At the competition, students present their problem and solutions to a panel of judges.
• Robot Design - students present their robot which they designed, built and programmed to a panel of judges (often industry experts).  They talk about the challenges they faced and hopefully overcame as well as describing the path they followed to achieve their goals.  They also present their programming demonstrating how they solved the challenges on the table.
• Core Values - students show how they have worked as a team honouring the FIRST values. Judging for this component often involves students participating in a short activity or challenge to help demonstrate how they worked as a team.

Each part is equally weighted although many teams place a higher empathise on the Robot Game as it is typically the part which captures the students imagination the most.

As a coach I love FLL for the depth of learning the students need to go into. The different components of the competition require the students to really think about the theme and the focus on core values ensure the students think about how they act and grow as young engineers.

The competitions are also very non competitive with students really encouraging each other regardless of their abilities.  At any one tournament it's not uncommon to see some teams completing >80% of the challenges on the tables while other teams still perform well completing <20%.  The focus is not on how much they achieve but the journey the took to get their.

In coming posts I'll be talking about the role of a coach in the team and how to balance helping students without doing the work for them as well as some resources I've found useful in the past in preparing the team for the tournament.