Need a simple, hands-on activity

[UlrikeDG]

Hi. I've been coaching FLL for two years, but I'm new to the forums. I hope I'm posting in the right place.

Our team has been invited to a robotics open house, and I'm looking for a SIMPLE activity we can have for kids to do when they walk by our table. We will have some Mindstorms kits to use that day, but we don't have to use them. Does anyone have any ideas for me?

Also, I know the age limit is 14 years, but what is the cutoff date? This is the first year I'll have a team member whose birth date falls during the FLL season, and I just realized that that might be an issue.

Thanks!!!

[TeamLeader]

Hi Ulrike.

We've done a couple of activities over the years, but most fall into the "simple to operate" rather than the "simple to build" category .

Our two most popular activities have been:

1) Robo Golf: One of our kids built a simple robot "golfer" that had angle of swing and power that could be set by the user before taking each swing (use motors to dial up the settings). A simple putting green was set up, and kids could take turns trying to find the positions and settings to score a hole-in-one.

2) Remote Sumo: Slightly more complex, but very entertaining. We built 3-4 sumo robots, each with a different attack option, and then built two joystick robots that controlled them via Bluetooth. Users selected their robots and had a three-round match against each other.

Is this the kind of thing you were looking for?

TeamLeader

[timdavid]

Originally Posted by UlrikeDG

...
Also, I know the age limit is 14 years, but what is the cutoff date? This is the first year I'll have a team member whose birth date falls during the FLL season, and I just realized that that might be an issue.

You should be fine. I think the age limit is 14 as of January 1 of the current Challenge year. For the Senior Solutions season, that would January 1, 2012. In a scenario where a kid has a birthday of January 2, they could be 15 for the bulk of the season and 16 years old for the state championships or World Festival and still meet the age rule.

As our regional partner states in this seasons instructions on starting a team:

Note: A child cannot be older than 14 on Jan. 1, 2012 to participate.

http://hightechkids.org/for-teams/how-start-fll-team

[Capnrmorgan]

For clarification: January 1st 2012 means a January 2nd birthday could change a 14 year old (on Jan 1st) to a 15 year old for competition in Jan - April for the championships. (Not 16 as stated above... in the US) Students can be 16 if registered in another country. I have a spreadsheet with the team members birthdays and a column for the last year challenge of eligibility. We had a team last year at our regional made up of 9-10th graders (14 year old girls changing to 15 in January?) It is an honor policy that the coach has to monitor.

If you have team members getting close to "graduation" start to look for local FTC teams and workshops to help get team ready to make the jump also there are scholarships from FIRST to help start FTC teams (for FLLer moving up)

Thanks,
Rich Morgan

[timdavid]

Originally Posted by Capnrmorgan

For clarification: January 1st 2012 means a January 2nd birthday could change a 14 year old (on Jan 1st) to a 15 year old for competition in Jan - April for the championships.

@Capnmorgan,
Here's the scenario I was envisioning:

A child was born on January 2, 1997.
On January 1, 2012, the child is still 14 and eligible for the Senior Solutions season.
On January 2, 2012, the child turns 15, but since they satisfied the original age requirement, they are still eligible to compete in the fall tournaments for Senior Solutions.
On January 2, 2013, the child turns 16, but is still eligible to complete in a possible State tournament (Minnesota typically has its state tournament in late January), or a possible berth at the World Festival or other event for Senior Solutions.

I could be wrong, you might want to check with your regional FLL partner for how they interpret the age limit rule. I have not personally encountered the age limitation yet - the kids I've been coaching are just starting 8th grade, and none of them are currently older than 13.

I agree that kids on the age limit bubble are probably better off looking at FTC or FRC challenges, but my understanding is that the age limit is intended to allow kids to compete in FLL up through 9th grade or so if they so desire.

If the kids are young for their grade level (as bright kids involved in FLL often are), they may still be under the age limit when they are in 10th grade.

p.s. the age limit rule is spelled out fairly clearly at the firstlegoleague site.

http://www.firstlegoleague.org/challenge/startateam

Team members must not exceed the maximum age on January 1 of the year the Challenge is released. For example, in the United States a student who turns 15 in May of 2012 would be eligible to compete in the Challenge released in August of 2012, whereas a child who turned 15 in December 2011 would not.

[Capnrmorgan]

Thank you for the clarification. I would hope that a 15 year old would want to move up to the next level of FIRST-FTC. When students are in 10th grade they are a little out of place competing against 9 year olds in 4th grade! I guess it depends on the coach/team situation. Note to coaches: When students go into 9th grade they are getting close to the upper age eligibility! Consider moving 9th graders into a FTC team!

[Dean Hystad]

Originally Posted by UlrikeDG

Our team has been invited to a robotics open house, and I'm looking for a SIMPLE activity we can have for kids to do when they walk by our table. We will have some Mindstorms kits to use that day, but we don't have to use them. Does anyone have any ideas for me?

I need more information. Are you looking for something to entertain passersby for a couple of minutes, or is it groups of kids moving from station to station doing organized activities? What period of time are we talking about?

[UlrikeDG]

Thanks for the ideas, everyone. I was really worried about this. A friend of mine suggested I let the kids make Lego mazes for Hexbug Nanos, and after some initial hesitation, I decided this will work well. Most of our team is on summer vacation, and the three members (and myself) who are staffing our table will only have an hour to set up, not enough time to build/program anything complex. I think we'll also have one or two Mindstorms units set up with light sensors so that the kids can check the inputs on them in various situations. The state FLL coordinators will be there with Mindstorms, as well.

Originally Posted by Capnrmorgan

If you have team members getting close to "graduation" start to look for local FTC teams and workshops to help get team ready to make the jump also there are scholarships from FIRST to help start FTC teams (for FLLer moving up)

Thanks! This year, we're going from 1 FLL team to 2 FLL teams *and* a Jr. FLL team! A local FTC team has offered to mentor us next year when we start our first FTC team. We should have at least 3 members who will be aging out of FLL after this season.

The team member I was worried about joined just this spring with her 12 yo sister. This will be their first FLL season. I was worried, because she'll turn 15 before Jan 2013, but if the cutoff was January 2012, she's fine. She'll be able to get some robotics experience this year and take that with her if she decides to do FTC with us next year.