It’s official! I’m an ORTOP First Lego League Rookie Coach!  We have a scholarship for the supplies – a registered team number – team members – and volunteers.

We had one hello how are ya meeting last week. The boys created their names out of legos while the parents chatted. The boys explained the how and why of their name plates – creative and fun! 

Tonight I showed a couple of videos of the Tournaments, the Body Forward kit  and talked about the commitment and the steps we would take to get to the tournament in December. I felt like a big meanie.  Standing in front of parents I did not know. Kids I did not know. Layin’ out the law and the focus of the group.

But then time for fun!  The boys and I pulled out eight bags of 60 lego pieces.  We di a Lego Education Challenge to create a wall with four rules.  1. It must be three inches high, or 8 blocks.  2. It must be seven and a half inches long, or 6 2×4 blocks. 3. It must have 2 windows, the windows must be the same size. 4. It must have a door. The Door must be larger than the windows.

It was interesting to watch the boys.  See a bag of legos. See the challenge. Blank looks. Diving in. Questioning eyes to parents. Re-stating the rules. Asking Can we, should we, may we.  Four Rules. That’s It. The rest is up to you.

It took a while for them to work together. To share parts. To offer help. Some would measure their walls. Some miscounted legos, misjudged the sizes. It was a fun exercise to me to see how they work together. How they think. Which ones talk things through. Want to share their ideas. Want to be lone rangers.

The second project we did was from LEGOSmart –a project of using assigned lego parts and assemble a structure that, when viewed from the top, has 100 dots. It took a while for the boys to realize their parts only had around 101 dots total. 🙂

At the end of the evening, after a bit of fun talking to the moms – it felt like I hosted a lego party. I hope the boys felt that way. It would be my goal that each week could be a learning opportunity – combined with a planned lego party.

The Robot and Kit got ordered yesterday – we should have it before next week’s meeting.  The boys did a brainstorming of name ideas and somehow went from Mega Minds to Taco Force.  Taco Force? I’ll let you know next week if they still like it. 🙂 Funny to say. Go ahead. Say it out loud. You can do it.

Onward – forward – with the courage of fools. 🙂

These little guys sure have alot of joy and creativity. I wonder what they will come up with this fall?