The Washburn Millerbots are in the news...

The Washburn Robotics team had a great weekend at the Minnesota Northstar Regional Competition. We're even featured in a news article that will appear in the University of Minnesota's Minnesota Daily newspaper. Enjoy!!

Robotics Season has Arrived!!!

The craziest, most adrenaline-filled time of the school year has arrived!  On Saturday, January 3rd the Washburn Millerbots (Team 2549) attended the 2009 FIRST Robotics kick-off at the University of Minnesota, and thus started the 6-week build season that will dominate my thinking through the middle of February.  

The challenge this year is called LUNACY.  

In this year's game, robots will be designed to pick up 9" game balls and score them in trailers hitched to their opponents' robots for points during a 2 minute and 15 second match. Additional points are awarded for scoring a special game ball, the Super Cell, in the opponents' trailers during the last 20 seconds of the match.  LUNACY is played on a low-friction floor, which means teams must contend with the laws of physics.  (press release www.usfirst.org)

Our team is busy brainstorming, sketching, and determining what strategy to use when competing in a game that is mimicking the 1/6th gravity environment of the moon.  Strategies from the past just won't do.

YouTube Video

I know this isn't totally related to our MILI grant "things", but this was an interesting venture into creating a video for posting on YouTube with my robotics students.  This was filmed, edited, and posted by student team members as a requirement for one of the 2009 First Robotics Challenge awards.  Enjoy!

Thing 3...Research Projects & MILI

So I finally motivated myself to look over Thing 3: Research Project Calculators & Dribbling.  As I reviewed some of the great organizational tools I thought, "How handy."  As it seems with many of the "Things" we discuss via the MILI grant I first think of how they apply to the scholarly life of my biological children before I think how I'd apply them to my classroom.  How would this tool keep family feuds to a minimum when learning that the research paper they've known about for 3 weeks is due in 3 days (UGH!!).  I like that an inanimate object can guide them through the process of choosing a research topic, creating a thesis statement, and sending them hounding emails re: what they should be doing to complete their literary assigment.

This time, however, my FIRST robotics team was in the forefront of my thoughts as I reviewed all of the support documents for creating a video.  The Millerbots have been tasked with creating a PSA (public service announcement) to promote robotics in high schools across America.  None of us on the team have done anything more than brief video clips that end up on facebook or You tube and we are feeling a bit "novice."  I think that many of the storyboarding worksheets, copyright and fair use info, and the video production step-by-step guide will really help this project move forward.  As is the goal with most of what happens related to high school robotics the adults try to facilitate rather than direct student achievements.  I hope they (the students) are as excited about these tools as I am. 

I also checked out the Google Educators links.  It looks like attending the Google Teacher Academy may be something I need to add to my life's "to do" list.  

As for the challenges related to using all of these great resources......TIME.  I don't have enough minutes in the day to do it all.  It would be great if as a building a committment would be made to introducing these tools consistently to all kids and then when the opportunity arises to use them it is not necessary to spend significant time "teaching" the process.  It would be nice to just create a step in the assignment that reads:  Step 1 - create an RPC for this assignment!  (and everyone would know what you're talking about).

As for dribbling.....hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.