First Lego League Meeting 3

Our goals for the third meeting were to focus on completing the Game Table Pieces, introduce the missions, show the Robot an finalize our team name.

We started by watching this video:

Then we broke into 2 teams to finish building the Game pieces for the missions.

We asked who had actually seen the NXT Robot before – an only 2 people raised their hands. One team member said that he had seen it, but didn’t like it. I got a lot of blank stares. We revealed the Robot that the boys had built from the instructions in the kit an they got a bit excited. I will confess my worries as a coach to boys who don’t seem to be grasping what the Lego League is ultimately for – building an programming the robot to perform the missions and working on the Project. I am wondering if other Rookie teams face this same challenge. Our team was formed haphazardly with a Library Signup List for Lego Club. I still have a three sets of parents who have no clue what we are doing. We have quite a few 8 year olds. My thought – is that as long as we stay on task – we’ll keep teaching the kids what to do next. I think in the next two weeks, some of the kids will see that this isn’t a “star wars mini fig club”. I did talk to one of the parents this evening and they may attend next week to check it out. Have you encountered these start up wonderings? The team mates were excited to see what all the mission parts would do when manipulated – we might have one more go with “playing” with them, however, almost all of the parts will need to be re-built after the rough play. I’ll nee to remember to set some guidelines next time. 🙂

(Putting on the Dual Lock)

We finalized the name – Taco Force. 🙂 It is a fun way to start our creative team – it is fun to say – and the kids have homework this week – To sketch out what they think Taco Force looks like – as a logo or explanation – they can rough sketch something out and verbally share with the team, and – to pick out a body part, internal or external that they would not want to break. Could be hair to a heart valve. Next week we’ll go through the body systems and parts and focus on the Project, then move to learning how to build the Robot.

I’d love to hear stories of how other rookie teams or first year teams made these transitions. All in all we met the night’s goals and are on track – so life is good. 🙂